I actually found a CPA to do my taxes, a lender that just got me a pre approval letter today and will probably use a realtor I met there to buy my next property.

IMO, it's the intent of the law, not so much the letters used.

Contact the three major bureuas dispute departments with a letter which includes the receipt.http://www.transunion.com/disputehttp://www.equifax.com/cs/Satellite?

Not sure if I should shock them with a phone call or send them a letter. 

Yup, pay your lawyer to write a scary letter. 

You aren't obligated to use the lender for financing, but I've found having a pre-qual letter in hand opens more doors.

I get 4 plus yellow letters each week as I actively buy in wholesale markets nationwide..

I would write a letter to that abandoned property with your return address on it.

REO's if you have submitted a POF Letter, why do thay ask for earnest money.  

i would if i were in that situation. so, these smaller dollar houses, the houses with lower loans, just sit. in the mean time, they fall apart. sometimes, and i have bought 2 houses this way, banks will just write the house off. if they figure the house will never bring enough money or they will have far too much money wrapped up in keeping the house for years before they can sell it, they just file a release of lien or release of mortgage on the house with the county and basically write it off their books. then, the previous owner has a free house. most of the time the owners have moved on and have no idea the bank did this because most often, the bank will send the letter to the last know address, which is the house they foreclosed on, and the people have already gone. what you have to do then is first, find the release of lien paperwork at the county. get a copy. find the owner. this part can be hard. what i did was run a check on the persons name to see if they own any houses in the area. chances are, if they moved, they rented a place, but they may actually own another house near by. do what you have to do to find them. look in the white pages if you have to. both of mine were found within 3 miles of the house. in the case you are talking about, it sounds like this guy is dead. ok, did he have any relatives?