State tries revoking license of LV mobile home dealer

Silver State Mobile Homes Inc. of Las Vegas will be fighting to stay in business today as the state seeks to revoke its license.

The state Manufactured Housing Division claims the company lied to lenders about the amount of down payments customers paid.

The state further contends Silver State sold mobile homes to customers that were subject to unpaid previous loans and that Silver State President Bob Swick failed to fully disclose his criminal history related to mobile home dealings in California when he applied for a license here in 1996.

A hearing is set at 9 a.m today and could continue several days.

"We vehemently deny we have done anything wrong," said Roger Croteau, an attorney representing the company.

Silver State contends that what the state is calling overstated down payments were, instead, rebates.

Silver State also faces proceedings in state court brought by Greensboro, N.C.-based Deutsche Financial Capital LLC. Deutsche Financial alleges in a $3 million suit that Silver State induced it to buy about $1 million in bad loans by overstating down payments.

Croteau alleges the lender should of known what was going on.

"The argument surrounds a case that one hand didn't know what the other hand was doing," he said.

But Deputy Attorney General Leslie Nielsen said documents used by Silver State allowed it to denote whether a transaction was a rebate or a down payment, and the deals were characterized as the latter.

For example, in one case the state contends a customer paid $2,500 but the down payment was represented as $23,414, according to documents filed by the Manufactured Housing Division. In another case, the state alleges no down payment was made but a $24,814 down payment was represented by Silver State.

In Deutsche Financial's suit, the lender agreed to buy from Silver State the loans of mobile home buyers. Deutsche bought about 74 loans worth about $3 million, company officials said in March when the suit was filed.

The company found that the default rate on loans related to its deal with Silver State was 35 percent, compared to an industry average of 2.5 percent.

Deutsche Financial sued get its money back.

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