Competent, Affordable Outside Counsel
Many mortgage companies find it difficult to locate competent and affordable counsel to defend their claims especially as they begin expanding into different states. But, there doesn’t need to be a trade-off between competency and affordability. Let LG Legal refer your cases to trusted counsel who work efficiently and give honest advice. Being in the industry, we understand how important it is to get cases resolved quickly in order to maintain investor relationships, warehouse lines of credit, and minimize losses. Accordingly, we only retain counsel who share the same belief and who work towards a quick resolution when possible.Mortgage Industry Legal Experts
LG Legal has retained law firms across the nation with expertise in every facet of the mortgage industry including compliance, audits, real estate, foreclosures, employment law, contracts, and business torts. Additionally, LG Legal offers vendor management and loan servicing quality control. Whatever your legal needs may be, LG Legal has a law firm ready to defend you at an affordable rate.Meet Our Team
BRETT C. LA CUES, ESQ.
SBN #234865
BRE #01971204
Brett C. La Cues graduated from the University of San Diego in 2000. He majored in Economics with minors in Business and International Relations. In 2004, he graduated from the University of San Diego School of Law, and was admitted to practice law in the State of California. Throughout his career, Mr. La Cues has represented mortgage companies, real estate agents, and brokers with an emphasis on business litigation, employment law, and real estate law. In addition to his experience as a litigator, Mr. La Cues has assisted his mortgage company clients with employment contracts, employee handbooks, audits, compliance, pending litigation letters, and has managed their out-of-state cases. Through the management of the out-of-state cases, Mr. La Cues built a network of attorneys who are well tested and well versed in the mortgage industry.
JONATHAN E.P. GWIN, ESQ.
SBN #272849
BRE #01751475
Since 1999, Jonathan E.P. Gwin has been involved in the mortgage industry in various leadership and sales positions in mortgage lending, banking, real estate and securities at Wachovia Bank, Wells Fargo Bank, and Accredited Home Lenders, where he participated in the #1 IPO on Wall Street in 2003. In 2010, Mr. Gwin obtained a law degree and passed the bar exam while maintaining his employment in the mortgage industry. Presently, Mr. Gwin is a board member, officer, and General Counsel of a national mortgage lender, American Financial Network, Inc. Mr. Gwin has successfully negotiated hundreds of cases prior to litigation, including cases with former employees, borrowers, investors, and other lenders.In his capacity as General Counsel, Mr. Gwin has retained outside counsel in various states across the nation. Through trial and error, Mr. Gwin has built a network of attorneys who have earned his trust to handle cases effectively and honestly.
Our Services
LG Legal provides the following services at no additional cost to the client:
- Route Lawsuits & Claims
- Central Billing Hub
- Case Updates
- Compliance Audits
- Vendor Management
- Servicing Quality Control
Route Lawsuits & Claims
Route lawsuits/claims. It’s often difficult for a client to find proven counsel at an affordable rate in each State where it has opened a branch office. Other times, certain legal issues arise that are outside the expertise of a client’s current counsel. We take the stress and guesswork out of locating counsel. When the client is served with a lawsuit, it simply needs to forward a copy to LG Legal. Let us route it to one of our trusted law firms who have expertise in representing mortgage companies. Regardless of the subject matter or state, we have a law firm that can handle the job.
Central Billing Hub
Keeping track of billing from multiple law firms and issuing multiple checks puts additional stress on the accounting department. Let LG Legal simplify the process. Each month, we obtain the billing generated by each of our retained law firms and provide it to General Counsel. Upon approval, the client only needs to issue one payment to LG Legal, and we disburse the appropriate payment to each law firm. By acting as a central billing hub for the client, LG Legal alleviates the stress of tracking multiple law firms, collecting multiple bills and making multiple payments.
Case Updates
We follow the cases that we refer to outside counsel and provide monthly updates to the client. Not only do we believe it’s important to keep the client informed, we understand that the client is required to update its investors, warehouse facilities, auditors, or state and federal agencies. Let LG Legal prepare case updates in a format that the legal department can easily cut and paste it into pending litigation letters.
Compliance Audits
LG Legal has partnered with Mortgage Quality Management & Research (“MQMR”) who support and assists clients in all of their compliance needs, including building and maintaining a comprehensive Compliance Management System through a review of policies and procedures and corrective actions. They are a premier company in the industry whose services include:- Monthly compliance support and assistance
- Policy, procedures and manuals
- Anti-money laundering audits
- GSE applications
- Internal audits
- CFPB mock audits
- LO compensation agreements
- Marketing service agreements (MSA) review
Vendor Management
LG Legal has partnered with HQ Vendor Management (“HQVM”) who has a vendor management program that seamlessly integrates with lenders to effectively monitor and manage vendors through:• Centralized repository for documentation and key vendor information
• Evaluating vendor contracts and itemizing key provisions and terms
• Incident reporting and performance monitoring capabilities
• Due diligence reviews of a vendor’s internal controls
• Conducting vendor on-site reviews
• Assessing a vendor's risk level
• Customized reporting
Servicing Quality Control
LG Legal has partnered with Subsequent QC, LLC (“SQC”) who is a premier provider of Servicing Quality Control audit solutions for mortgage lenders and servicers. SQC has extensive experience in forensic loan reviews and the servicing environment, and focuses exclusively on managing servicing risk for clients and offer the auditing perspective and detail needed to ensure regulatory compliance and build investor confidence.Customizable by loan type, servicing process, regulatory needs, investor guidelines, loan status and targeted issues such as refinance opportunities, SQC services can be tailored to start with the risk factors you need to control the most.
Our Fees
LG Legal does not bill the client directly.
Instead, LG Legal’s fees are built into the hourly rate charged by each retained law firm. Presently, LG Legal has negotiated attorney rates between $200 and $395 across the nation—these rates are inclusive of LG Legal’s fees.How does LG Legal bring its clients such reduced rates from top law firms? It’s based on the volume of cases LG Legal refers to its network of attorneys. Typically, one client alone cannot generate enough legal work to justify such a deep discount, but, through LG Legal, it can benefit from the collective legal work generated by multiple clients. The power in numbers gives LG Legal’s clients the edge in the marketplace. LG Legal does not bill for Compliance Audits, Vendor Management, or Servicing Quality Control. LG Legal brings those services to the client at cost. Prices for these services vary because they are customized based on each client’s needs.
We look forward to hearing from you.
Contact Us
Find Us
- 3131 Camino Del Rio North.
Suite 415
San Diego, CA 92108