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March 15, 2010 (Regular Meeting) Page 1859 recorded with the Cabarrus County Register of Deeds which evidence any other owner of record other than The CIT Group/Consumer Finance, Inc. ("CIT Group"). My client Research City, LLC was the buyer of the property pursuant to the foreclosure sale. Mr. Clifton and Mr. Miller assigned their bids in the bid process to Research City, LLC and received payment for the same at closing. Upon taking title to the property and knocking on the door to investigate who was occupying the property he now owned, Ed McAfee, Manager of Research City, LLC, found that Mr. and Mrs. Shawn Alston were the occupants of the property. These were the owners prior to the foreclosure by Mr. Glass on behalf of CIT Group. Obviously, Mr. McAfee was extremely surprised to find the Alstons in the property since all title searching revealed that CIT Group was now the owner. They Alstons informed Mr. McAfee that they had filed bankruptcy prior to the CIT Group's foreclosure becoming final, and in fact were still in Chapter 13 bankruptcy. They also informed Mr. McAfee that they had been making payments not to CIT Group but to GMAC Mortgage. Further investigation by me revealed that the Alstons had in fact filed bankruptcy the day before the ten-day upset bid period was to expire in the CIT Group foreclosure, which had the effect of immediately suspending that foreclosure and depriving Mr. Glass of any further authority to complete that foreclosure. Nonetheless, it would appear that Mr. Glass was not aware of this, and therefore completed the foreclosure by recording the trustee's deed, filing the notice of foreclosure for sale and otherwise completing the foreclosure in a proper manner apparently unaware of the intervening bankruptcy filing. I have attempted to contact Mr. McKee, who represents GMAC, to discuss the bankruptcy filing. From what I can determine, it would appear that the Chapter 13 bankruptcy is still in place and that at some point CIT Group assigned its note and deed of trust to GMAC Mortgage; however, no assignment appears of record in Cabarrus County. It further appears that, pursuant to a motion by GMAC Mortgage, the automatic stay has been lifted with regard to the real property, allowing GMAC Mortgage to proceed with foreclosure. All of the foregoing makes the foreclosure proceeding I conducted, including the deed into Research City, LLC, the payments pursuant thereto to the Association, Mr. Clifton and Mr. Miller, void. See the North Carolina Court of Appeals case of Beneficial Mortgage Co. v. The Barrington and Jones Law Firm, 164 N.C. App. 41, 595 S.E. 2d 705 (2004); which is a situation almost exactly like the situation at hand. This case is controlling in this matter and renders the foreclosure I conducted as well as that of Mr. Glass void. The Association has returned the funds it received to my trust account, as have Mr. Miller and Mr. Clifton. I am holding in trust an executed quitclaim deed executed by my client and ready for recording with the Cabarrus County Register of Deeds releasing any interest Research City, LLC may have in the property of record back to CIT Group and the Alstons. My client paid three years of back taxes to the Cabarrus County tax assessor in this matter as well as other closing costs which he is entitled to have returned to him. We have requested these funds from the Cabarrus County tax assessor, and they are investigating the matter. If they are not returned, these funds should be paid back to my client by the Alstons or by GMAC, who would be unjustly enriched by this payment. The following needs to be accomplished to rectify this matter: 1. Mr. Glass needs to "undo" his completed foreclosure, probably by filing something in the foreclosure case as well as by recording a quitclaim deed with the Cabarrus County Registry back to the Alstons. 2. I will record the quitclaim deed back to CIT Group and the Alstons.