Promising to hold lenders accountable for abuses that helped fuel the foreclosure crisis, California has entered into a broad alliance with the state of Nevada to investigate the nation's mortgage industry.

On Tuesday, California Attorney General Kamala Harris joined Nevada Attorney General Catherine Cortez Masto in Los Angeles to announce the pact, which they said will fast-track their previously separate investigations. California and Nevada have the highest foreclosure rates in the nation.

"We believe that there must be accountability and consequences associated with this crisis," Harris said. "We also believe there must be meaningful relief for people in the process of foreclosure and in the process of modifying their home loans."

The deal follows Harris' announcement in October that California was pulling out of nationwide settlement talks with the country's biggest banks. Since then, the state has aggressively pursued its own investigation into "robo-signing" allegations that banks and mortgage servicers rubber-stamped foreclosures without actually reviewing homeowners' documents.

Harris has said the proposed national settlement – widely reported to be about $20 billion – was inadequate and provided too much immunity for bank officials.

On Tuesday, she said that a wide-ranging investigation could "provide a better sense" of a fair deal for California homeowners.

So far, the state has subpoenaed more than a million pages of documents from many of the nation's largest financial institutions and mortgage servicers, including Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, Bank of America Corp. and Lender Processing Services Inc.

Nevada's Masto, meanwhile, sued Bank of America last December for allegedly violating a 3-year-old agreement with her state over predatory lending practices by its Countrywide unit.

Masto's suit, which was amended in August, alleged that the nation's largest lender filed wrongful foreclosures against homeowners with pending loan modification requests and raised interest rates on troubled borrowers after promising to lower them.

According to Harris, the pact will link Nevada's mortgage strike force with California's team, which consists of 40 attorneys, investigators and accountants.

Both states will share intelligence, witnesses, subpoenaed documents, litigation strategies and other resources, Harris said.

Harris said California is not only investigating abuses in the servicing and originating of mortgage loans, but also is looking at foreclosure rescue schemes that prey on distressed homeowners "who are trying to do anything and everything to keep their homes."

John Sprankling, a property law expert at McGeorge School of Law in Sacramento, said sharing personnel, resources and insight to address a common problem will benefit both states, given today's budgetary constraints. Many of the alleged abuses by loan originators and mortgage servicers in both states are similar, and much of the alleged misconduct involves the same national banks, he said.

"This brings more firepower to the efforts of both attorney generals to investigate and potentially bring joint litigation against the banks and mortgage servicers," added Paul Leonard, California director for the nonprofit Center for Responsible Lending.

In recent months, lenders have stepped up their foreclosure efforts in California and Nevada.

According to Irvine-based RealtyTrac, notice of default filings in California – the first step in the foreclosure process – increased 17 percent in October to a 13-month high of 29,240.

That gave California the second-highest foreclosure rate in the country, with one in every 243 housing units receiving a new foreclosure filing.

Only one state – Nevada – has a problem that's more severe. The Silver State's foreclosure rate was tops in the country in October, with one in every 180 homes receiving a foreclosure notice.

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