Loan holder wants a check from the insurance company that I already cashed and used to repair my car
What would happen if you was to cash a check, didn’t realize it was   to you and your finance company, take it to a local business that has   a money center, they cash the check without even having you sign let   alone having the finance companies endorsement on it . The money   cleared my account like a couple months ago and it was just brought up   now .. ? The reason why the check was made out the owner and the lender is to make sure the repairs were done on the car. The lender wants to make sure that their investment is protected.  For example: you get a six year loan on a new car. In the second year you get hit by another driver. The damage estimate is $1,000, and you decide it doesn't look that bad, so you decide to skip the repair and spend the money on paying off debts. What you don't know is that if they had done the repair they would have found hidden damage and the repair would have cost $3,000 and would have been covered by the other persons insurance.  Jump ahead 2 years, the rust from the skipped repair causes other issues. Now it will cost $5,000 to fix. The insurance won't cover it, and now a car with an outstanding loan balance of $4,000 and a value of $10,000 if the damage didn't exist needs $5,000 to fix.  The lender wants the repairs done. They would have not signed the check before seeing the proof the repairs were done to their satisfaction. But because the check was cashed without their involvement they will be looking for a detailed receipt showing that all the work was done. They may require that the repair be done at a certified repair shop with manufacturer parts.  If you don't have a detailed bill ask the repair shop for a copy of the original one. "There are at least three financial institutions involved here: your insurance company's bank, the money center, and your bank. Normally, they would keep records, but given that the money center didn't even ask for your signature, ""normal"" probably doesn't apply to them. Still, you can still ask them what records they have, in addition to the other two institutions; the company's bank and your bank likely have copies of the check."
You keep a copy of the dashed check, and tell him to pound sand. If he contacts you again, you tell him that you will charge him with fraud. By accepting the check and cashing it, he acknowledged the debt is paid. Deposit check and send a personal check (resulting in tax and IRS reporting issues) That's a bad idea, unless maybe the check you're receiving is a certified bank draft. Suppose the insurance company are crooks and the check is fraudulent. It could take weeks or months for some investigation to catch up to that, long after your own personal check was cashed by the pharmacy. The bank will then put you on hook for the 20 grand by reversing the check, even though the funds had been deposited into your account. Do not put yourself into the position of a money handler; you don't have the cash base, insurance, government protection and whatever else that a bank has. And, of course, you're being a free money handler if you do that. (You're not even compensated for postage, time and whatnot). If you're handling money between two parties, you should collect a percentage, or else refuse. That percentage has to be in proportion to the risk, since cashing a check for someone carries a risk similar to (and is effectively a form of) making a loan. Maybe there's more to this story, because as written, your sister seems, well, a little irrational. Is it possible that the bank will try to cheat you and demand that you pay a loan again that you've already paid off? Or maybe not deliberately cheat you, but make a mistake and lose track of the fact that you paid? Sure, it's POSSIBLE. But if you're going to agonize about that, what about all the other possible ways that someone could cheat you? What if you go to a store, hand over your cash for the purchase, and then the clerk insists that you never gave him any cash? What if you buy a car and it turns out to be stolen? What if you buy insurance and when you have a claim the insurance company refuses to pay? What if someone you've never met or even heard of before suddenly claims that you are the father of her baby and demands child support? Etc etc. Realistically, banks are fanatical about record-keeping. Their business is pretty much all about record-keeping. Mistakes like this are very rare. And a big business like a bank is unlikely to blatantly cheat you. They can and do make millions of dollars legally. Why should they break the law and risk paying huge fines and going to prison for a few hundred dollars? They may give you a lousy deal, like charge you outrageous overdraft fees and pay piddling interest on your deposit, but they're not going to lie about how much you owe. They just don't. I suggest that you not live your life in fear of all the might-be's. Take reasonable steps to protect yourself and get on with it. Read contracts before you sign, even if the other person gets impatient while you sit there reading. ESPECIALLY if the other person insists that you sign without reading. When you pay off a loan, you should get a piece of paper from the bank saying the loan has been paid. Stuff this piece of paper in a filing cabinet and keep it for years and years. Get a copy of your credit report periodically and make sure that there are no errors on it, like incorrect loan balances. I check mine once every year or two. Some people advise checking it every couple of months. It all depends how nervous you are and how much time you want to spend on it. Then get on with your life. Has your sister had some bad experience with loans in the past? Or has she never borrowed money and she's just confused about how it works? That's why I wonder if there's more to the story, if there's some basis for her fears. The bottom line is something in your story is not adding up.   You had two checks one that is voided, and one that is not.  Lets say they are both written against your account for $100.  Lets also assume that have exactly $100 in your account. You give the Liquor Store the voided one, they give you $100, but when they attempt to cash the check at their bank they are denied and assessed a $20 fee.  You spend the $100 they gave you; however, you still should have $100 in your account as the check was not cashed. You want to make things right with the liquor store.  You should be able to withdraw the $100 you still have in the bank and give them that much.  While they will still be out the $20 fee, that should make them feel much better about you as a customer.  Tell them when you will be paid and that you will give them the $20 on that date.  Then do so. The only way this problem is not solvable is that you spent the $100 that was left in the bank.  In that case, the Liquor store is correct you stole the money.  More accurately you spent money that wasn't yours. If the check is written as a check to BigCo, it is less clear how Jack can compensate himself for the equity sale. It is as if the equity was owned by the corporation, not by Jack. This is correct.  If the check is written to BigCo, then it is BigCo issuing new shares.  Jack doesn't compensate himself for the equity sale, as he didn't sell anything.  The company traded shares for money which it uses for expansion.  In the long term, the capital gain from expansion may exceed the value of a $200,000 no-interest loan to the company.   If the value of the company before investing $250,000 is $1 million, then the value after investing is $1.25 million.  So $250,000 is 20% of the value of the company.  BigCo should not give the buyer 25% of BigCo but only 20% in that example.  If it does give 25%, the buyer is getting a $312,500 stake for only $250,000.   With the other example, Jack sells 25% of the company for $250,000 from his personal shares.  This doesn't change the assessed value of the company, just Jack's stake.  Jack then loans the company $200,000.  This also doesn't change the assessed value of the company (at least in theory).  It gains $200,000 but has an offsetting debt of $200,000.  In net, that's no change.  Assets and liabilities balance the same.   So if you know that the assessed value of the company is $1 million and that the buyer is paying $250,000 for a 25% stake at that same valuation, then you know that the check is being written to Jack.  If the check is written to BigCo, then one or more of those numbers is incorrect.   The buyer could be getting a 20% stake.  The new value of the company after the investment is $1.25 million.   Or paying $333,333.33.  The new value of the company after the investment is $1,333,333.33.   Or BigCo could only be worth $750,000 before the investment.  The new value of the company after the investment is $1 million.   Or Jack is getting screwed, selling $312,500 in stock (25%) for only $250,000.  Jack's shares drop from being worth $1 million to only $937,500.  The value of the company is $1.25 million.   Or some combination of smaller changes that balances. I would always presume that given a choice of doing what is in its own self interest verses in the customer's interest, a bank will ALWAYS do the former rather than the latter. Banks are in the business of making money, always presume that their policies, processes and contractual terms will be slanted to maximize their ability to make money.  It's not being evil or anything, it's just business, they are under no obligation to be altruistic or do what's best for you at the expense of their profits. So, especially since it's not exactly a hardship, I would always make extra principal payments using a separate check and clearly mark it as an extra principal payment. "this is a bit unusual, but not unheard of. i have known more than one car whose owner was not its driver.  besides the obvious risk that the legal owner of the car will repossess it, this seems fairly safe.  your insurance should cover any financial liability that you incur during an accident.  even if the car is repossessed by the owner, you are only out the registration fees. i would suggest you avoid looking this gift horse in the grill.  her father on the other hand might be in for some drama and financial mess if he has a falling-out with his ""friend"". this arrangement reminds me of divorces where one spouse owns the car, but the other drives it and pays the loan.  usually, when the relationship goes south, one spouse is forced to sell the car at a loss." It seems like there are  a few different things going on here because there are multiple parties involved with different interests. The car loan almost surely has the car itself as collateral, so, if you stop paying, the bank can claim the car to cover their costs.  Since your car is now totaled, however, that collateral is essentially gone and your loan is probably effectively dead already.  The bank isn't going let you keep the money against a totaled car.  I suspect this is what the adjuster meant when he said you cannot keep the car because of the loan. The insurance company sounds like they're going to pay the claim, but once they pay on a totaled car, they own it.  They have some plan for how they recover partial costs from the wreck.  That may or may not allow you (or anyone else) to buy it from them.  For example, they might have some bulk sale deal with a salvage company that doesn't allow them to sell back to you, they may have liability issues with selling a wrecked car, etc.  Whatever is going on here should be separate from your loan and related to the business model of your insurance company.  If you do have an option to buy the car back, it will almost surely be viewed as a new purchase by the insurances company and your lender, as if you bought a different car in similar condition. "The wording of this question is very confusing because ""primary signer"" would, in ordinary parlance, mean the person borrowing the money and the co-signer (not consigner) would mean the one who is guaranteeing the repayment of the loan: if the borrower does not pay, the co-signer is liable for making the payments. Whose name is on the title of the car? Who borrowed the money to buy the car? Is the loan in your name and your son co-signed the loan to induce the bank to loan you money to purchase the car, or is it the other way around, that your son borrowed the money and you co-signed the loan in order to induce the bank to loan your son the money? If the car title and the loan are in your name, are you defaulting on the loan and so your son is making the loan payments that should have come from you? Or is it that your son borrowed the money to buy the car, his name is on the title, he is making the payments, and you are no longer interested in backing him up in case he defaults and the bank comes after you for the money?" It's always hard to know the exact policy terms, but as a general rule there are two main contributions to insurance payouts. The first part covers expenses aimed at restoring the situation to its previous state pre-incident. This may include repair work and materials etcetera. The second part kicks in when it's not reasonably possible to repair the damage, or at least not in a financially efficient way. In this case, the insurer can decide to pay out the decrease in value. This is in fact very common in car accidents, where the car is a total loss.  In your case, it's quite possible that your roof, even with the two partial repairs is in a worse condition than it was before the storm. For instance, the new shingles may not match the old ones exactly. Thus the value of your home has decreased despite the reasonable repair attempt. And as mhoran_psprep points out, there can be hidden damage as well, which is a lurking liability. If you've accepted the cash payment in lieu of a full repair, you also accept the roof in its new condition. "I believe the banks are protecting themselves when they ""require"" your endorsement. Years ago. they used to ask for your endorsement, and not require it. If you endorse the check, it legally authorizes them to debit your account, if the check is later returned for non-sufficient funds (NSF). It mostly protects the bank, and not the customer." Once the loan is taken out, Chase would turn around and sell that debt to others, getting all their money upfront and leaving both the person who took the loan out and the new creditor holding the bag.  I worked for a company that used to do this with loans for other things.  They company was Norvergence and were complete scumbags. There are many situations where injecting a certain amount of cash at the right time may reap rewards far in excess of the value of the cash injected. For example, if someone who needs a car to get to work gets in a wreck and that person does not have ready money to make it driveable may have no choice but to secure very expensive financing.  Receipt of $1000 in ready money to repair the car may thus save the person from having to take out a loan that would cost $1200 or more to repay. While the insurance business has sufficient overhead that it is unlikely that insurance would generally have a positive net expectation even considering such factors, it is at least theoretically possible that insurance could have a positive expected value for both the insurer and the insured (and in some cases it may have positive expected values for both parties in practice as well). Adding international bonds to an individual investor's portfolio is a controversial subject.  On top of the standard risks of bonds you are adding country specific risk, currency risk and diversifying your individual company risk.  In theory many of these risks should be rewarded but the data are noisy at best and adding risk like developed currency risk may not be rewarded at all. Also, most of the risk and diversification mentioned above are already added by international stocks.  Depending on your home country adding international or emerging market stock etfs only add a few extra bps of fees while international bond etfs can add 30-100bps of fees over their domestic versions.  This is a fairly high bar for adding this type of diversification.  US bonds for foreign investors are a possible exception to the high fees though the government's bonds yield little. If your home currency (or currency union) does not have a deep bond market and/or bonds make up most of your portfolio it is probably worth diversifying a chunk of your bond exposure internationally.  Otherwise, you can get most of the diversification much more cheaply by just using international stocks. "... interest rates will go up.  When that happens prices will be kept down.   (if you can only afford $1,500/month payments and the interest portion of the mortgage goes up then you have less to spend on the house)  There are also millions of houses that are foreclosed or in some process of foreclosure that are being kept off the market.  That ""shadow inventory"" being kept off the market is keeping supply artificially low.  At some point the shadow inventory will be brought to market and as supply increases it will hold prices down.  ... [housing prices could drop another 20% or more](http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304299304577348083297932466.html)...  and it could take a decde or more before the housing market works through the effects of the great recession.  btw, I just refinanced again.  It was easier this time than any of the other times I've refinanced.  This time I got 2.875% for 10 years...  I'll save over 20 grand of interest over the next 10 years.   The banks are loaning money out, and at incredibly low interest rates."