Comments on: Talkback: Mortgage modification

By: Danielle in Tucson, AZ

Danielle in Tucson, AZ — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 19:14:35 +0000

It’s been an exercise in futility. Who’s really in charge here? It’s not the government. It’s obviously big business, interpreting policies the way they want to and then taking as long as possible to implement anything. I have severe doubts, seeing how this stimulus has been carried out, about any sort of health care reform actually being carried out either.

Similar to a few others here, I have contacted my servicer (GMAC Mortgage) multiple times over the past number of months for a refinance under the Making Homes Affordable plan. They have continued to say that I do not qualify due to the Lender Paid Mortgage Insurance on my loan. Ironically, they kept referring me to MakingHomeAffordable.gov for more info…everything on there tells me I should be eligible for the refinance option, yet GMAC Mortgage is telling me I’m not. Very frustrating! I contacted Freddie Mac and they advised me to try a 3rd party lender (since that was allowed after October 1st.) All that I tried wouldn’t do it because they were not yet honoring the 125% loan-to-value ratio; just the 105%. (My home is too upside down.) One independed broker thought she was going to be able to do a short-refinance, but then found out that GMAC Mortgage is not accepting third party short-pay refi’s.

In my last exchange with the loan officer at GMAC mortgage, he referred me to the Loss Mitigation department. They’ve told me I don’t qualify for a loan modification because of my gross income (which is right at the borderline of the 31% payment to income ratio.) Who lives off of their gross income and has no other expenses, though?! All I know is that I’m scraping bottom or having to put stuff on credit cards each month even though I’ve cut back on just about everything aside from adequate nutrition and gas to get to work.

The latest attempt is applying for a modification with the help of a HUD-approved mortgage counselor at a local non-profit. She said they should be taking all of the expenses into consideration, too, not just gross income. We’ll see what happens, but I have little hope after the run-around I’ve gotten. If you’re making your payments, they clearly have no motivation to lower your interest rate/payment.

Like I said, it’s clear the government has no authority when it comes to these large corporations.

By: Jane Smith, Gettysburg Pa

Jane Smith, Gettysburg Pa — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 18:07:35 +0000

Husband layed off for a year 3 times from 3 companys. Mortgage payments were behind by 1 month. we were told they could not help unless we were 3 months behind. As soon as that happened we did all the paperwork and still were turned down. Now we are 6 months behind and filling out all the paperwork again!! The Obama plan IS NOT HELPING unless of course you sre a bank.

By: AmosLH

AmosLH — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 15:59:45 +0000

It has been an absolute nightmare. When I call the mortgage company, they are rude, snotty, you name it. I’ve filled out all of the paperwork, been denied, called back and told that they never received the paperwork.

I’ve finally given up and decided to try and sell the home I love dearly in a short sale.

I had the run around also from the mortgage company saying that I wasn’t behind and they would help me in November. That was back in August. They still won’t help me.

It is the hurry up and wait game with no end result except dissappointment

By: Denise McMillan, Oak Park, CA

Denise McMillan, Oak Park, CA — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 09:00:10 +0000

If you have enough equity in your home, the banks won’t help you. They are motivated to foreclose because once they own it they can sell your property at a profit. This is ironic because for so many years homeowners were encouraged to pay their mortgages off early in order to completely own their own homes.

If you are upside-down/underwater, you have a certain amount of leverage. First file a complaint with the regulatory authority for your bank (Google it, in the case of JPMorgan Chase/WAMU it’s the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency for your state), and in the complaint also ask for the name of the insurance company that insures your loan.

Write a certified letter to the bank’s insurance company that you’ve done everything you possibly can and more, but the bank refuses to modify or refinance your loan to allow you to remain in your home and keep the payments current. Advise the bank’s insurance company that if you default and the bank makes a claim against the insurance policy, then the insurance company should refuse to pay the claim because you, the homeowner, tried his or her very best to keep the loan current but the bank refused, lied and stonewalled. The bank has in effect committed insurance fraud.

No guarantees, but push back. If enough people do that, the insurance companies will eventually notice.

And it’s not the President’s fault. Don’t blame him.

By: Ron Johnson, New London, MO

Ron Johnson, New London, MO — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 03:48:37 +0000

I just sent a post and wanted to send a photo. I was not sure if this is possible, but I will try because it is very appropriate for my situation and how I feel.

I can’t seem to copy and paste a photo. Where can I send it? It reinforces my case.

By: Ron Johnson, New London, MO

Ron Johnson, New London, MO — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 03:39:19 +0000

As I read these comments, (all 911 of them so far)I can relate that my story is no different. The Obama program is simply not working. I have been trying for 16 months (unsuccessfully) to get some type of modification of my mortgage. I have tried it all. Two different attorneys, Hope Now, H4H, Forensic Loan Audit,hundreds of hours of letters, faxes, e-mails, and calls to my loan servicer/lender (OCWEN and HSBC),all to no avail, so I have given up. My house is in foreclosure for the 2nd time in 6 months. My paperwork could never be complete, no matter how hard I tried (9 times I sent docs to them–the last 3 times sent via certified mail and they still deny having the docs). I sent everything they asked for each time.I could not please them. Either you make too much money or you don’t make enough money, or you are missing documents. The Lenders are full of excuses. Each time they would ask me for “missing” documents”. It is all smoke and mirrors. The Servicers make more money stalling and then foreclosing on us. The first time they tried to foreclose on me while, at the same time, my attorney was working with them, and Hope Now on a Loan Modiication. The only reason they dropped the foreclosure was because they had not done their paperwork correctly, so my attorney forced them to cancel it. Now, the 2nd time they are foreclosing on me a few days after they said they would give me a “Deed-in-Lieu of Foreclosure”. They want to make sure they have us coming and going. I simply don’t give a shit anymore and I am walking away. Let them do whatever they are big enough to do! You can’t fight them. They are simply too big and NOBODY (got that, Mr Obama??–NOBODY not even you)can stop them. As long as the programs are voluntary, they will never work. Obama had the right idea, but failed to hold any of the lenders/servicers accountable. It really does not matter who you write or call because it falls on deaf ears. All it does accomplish is that it makes us feel a little better to get it off our chest. I just go outside and scream. It feels a lot better!!!

By: M. Byrne, Long Island, N.Y.

M. Byrne, Long Island, N.Y. — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 01:22:56 +0000

I have been waiting a year and a half for Wells Fargo to modify my mortgage.
I saw the writing on the wall for me in 2008. I bought my home in 2006. The value was going down. I lost my job and still Wells Fargo has not come up with any plan that works. I am a senior citizen and I have income that could be used for making a mortgage payment although at a lower rate. These banks took help for themselves but are s l o w to do something for their customers.

By: Lynde, Umpqua OR

Lynde, Umpqua OR — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 04:10:05 +0000

Even more frustrating when I hear about all these other people not being successful; I applied in Febr 09 to Wells Fargo. In about 6 weeks I got a denial for lack of income…I took a pay cut; but they had misinterpreted my income and expense statement and so they agreed to put me back in the cue if I would resubmit everything. So I did….I waited. A couple weeks later, I was absoluted disgusted when they put me a a list with solitors trying to get me to agree to a ’short sale’, that the same as losing my home. I told them don’t have any more sales people call me about a short sale, I was insulted. I put $50,000 down, I have made all my payments and on time. Why would I want to give my house away? So, I called 13 more times and could not get anyone who was willing to tell me the status. Finally, last week, someone actually told me what had happened–as soon as I told them to take me off their short sale list beacuas I only wanted to keep my house–they had taken my application out of the system, closed it. This month 10 of nothing but the run-around…I even paid one of those attorney firms $3,000 to see if they could do something for me…after they took my money, they said they couldn’t help me bacause I had other rental properties (they didn’t tell me that before they took the money. Nothing could be more frustrating than working 45 years day in day out, investing in my home, spending money to improve it, to see my home depreciate another $100,000- below what I paid for it…and where’s that glimmer of hope we are all looking for…certainly not in another failure of a program wasting all of our tax dollars. You know even if a modification goes through the Bank’s who were participants in egregious unfair (and unscrupulous)lending practices get more out of the deal than the homeowner ever will. But it’s never enough.

By: Tom Concord, CA

Tom Concord, CA — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 00:35:57 +0000

So far I have sent in my loan modification paperwork 5 times. 3 of the times my loan holder “misplaced” the paper work. The other times they told me I was approved but I never received the package. I finally filed a complaint with the better business bureau and the office of thrift supervision. Lo and behold I had a manager call me the next day but their only solution is to start the entire process over again. Read some of the nightmares about Indymac bank online they are the absolute worst. Especially since it took billions of taxpayer dollars to prevent this company from folding.

I meet all qualifications for Obama’s foreclosure plan and my loan is owned by Fannie Mae but Indymac is refusing to use Obama’s plan.

I would say the plan is complete garbage.

By: Robin Rainie, Dana Point, CA

Robin Rainie, Dana Point, CA — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 19:22:45 +0000

When we realized we were headed upside down in our neg am mortgage on our home we tried to get a loan mod with AHMSI, the company. They denied us saying we “could not afford a modification”. So we stopped paying and shortsaled the house, moving aboard our boat. Our second home in NH was being rented out, also not covering its payments on a neg am mortgage. We have been turned down twice by Aurora for loan mods with the same reasoning. We are asking for any suggestions for how we can keep this house we have had for 40 years from going upside down. After a horrible two years of bad luck financially we now have very little overhead and both have good jobs. We may have to sell our boat and try renting an apartment if we can’t get a loan mod. Can the president’s program possibly help us?

By: Dana Wiese, Bradenton, Fl.

Dana Wiese, Bradenton, Fl. — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 14:41:27 +0000

Our house was on the market in May 2008 when the bubble burst. We couldn’t keep up with the payments anymore ($4K a month take home pay, $3.2K a month mort./ins/taxes)so we were trying to sell. We borrowed from wherever we could to keep up till no more was left..just an additional $60K debt and a house not worth the money we owed on it. USAA is our mortgage co., PHH is the servicer. We asked them for help over and over. Provided them requested paperwork by mail and fax repeatedly. 2 months ago (Sept 2009) they sent us all the financial and government ‘Making Home Affordable’ paperwork and enrolled us in the trial program for 3 months – with a payment we can afford. We completed, signed and mailed back our paperwork with our 1st check. We’re about to make our 3rd and supposedly final trial payment. I’ve called to ask our status and if they need any additional info. They (PHH) said they got our checks and are sure they got the paperwork ..supposedly scanned in Oct 27th. We’ll see what happens. We are sick and tired of being jerked around while they get bailed out. Let em keep the place if it dosent fly…

By: Trevor Beckford

Trevor Beckford — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 13:03:19 +0000

My name is Trevor Beckford and I was laid off from work over one year ago. There is only one income in the home and I am receiving unemployment for now. I have applied for a home modification over six months ago, only to have my lender loose my paperwork. I resubmitted it several times but remain in limbo. It has been a long time, I even senta letter to Bank of Americas CEO to no avail. All we need isd a loan modification and we should be o.k.. Bank Of America seems as though they are playing games with peoples homes and this game is not funny.

By: Debbie Seals Indianapolis, IN

Debbie Seals Indianapolis, IN — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 12:52:50 +0000

I have tried four times with different lenders to refinance and get every excuse under the sun why they can’t. One lender told me my credit was too bad, another told me since I paid some of my payments in cash they couldn’t prove that I was actually making the payments even though I have receipts and the most recent idiots are National City which is now PNC. They sent me paperwork with National City logos and after over 45 days of working with them and following up weekly with them on the progress they say “oh, you need to do this all over with the PNC logo.” I am in a Chapter 13 and had to have judge approve this in all cases and a court order was provided to all the places but now I have to waste the federal taxpayers money to obtain this court order again with PNC’s name because they were not smart enough to prepare themselves for a merger they orchestrated. Financial institutions need to be audited from the ground up as they have no idea what they are doing.

By: Lorna Baxter, Portland, OR

Lorna Baxter, Portland, OR — Sun, 15 Nov 2009 04:16:55 +0000

I called Bank of America to make my mortgage payment. I am in a trial payment program through Make My Home Affordable program. The customer service person let’s me know our forclosure is on hold and we are delinquent. I July I called the bank to let them know we could not meet the full amount of our mortgage. We were told if we could not make payment in full, to not pay for two months and we would be eligible to apply for the mortgage program to reduce our payments. This month, the lady said they view us a delinquent and levied and late fee on our last payment. I let her know we have been paying before the deadline date, the new amount the bank said we needed to pay. She could see that information, but said as long as we are waiting for the programs final response, we would be considered delinquent. I asked why we were only billed a late fee for last month only. She said they have the option to do that. I let her know it makes our further payments incomplete and we are not supposed to be delinquent while we are waiting for final approval. I let her know this something about this appears to be fraudulent! I realized that I used my home phone to make this payment and complaint. I’ve learned my lesson to use my cell phone so I can log the date of my call. I don’t know who to call, but I really feel I need some kind of representation or someone to monitor what Bank of America is doing.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 23:35:36 +0000

The dream of homeownership became a nightmare. From high loans to fix the loans in loan modification. The banks are not really working to solve this area if they would the USA would not be in foreclosures and the economic negative impact with job loss. These loans were created by the banks and with its accomplices who knew this would happen. They are not helping some of the people with stalling processes not progress. Banks are allowing borrowers to become behind and increase their loan amount by waiting for months and later try to help. The fix is the homeowner ends up owning a higher loan amount – Loanowners Banks should be help accountable by their predatory actions are not regulated by the congress.

By: marilyn Woodbury Tn

marilyn Woodbury Tn — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 18:11:33 +0000

All I can say is this. IF there are any Vets out there who have a VA loan and are looking to modify. Get the VA involved. That’s what We did. I had 5 phones in one day from Citi-Mortgage.Before that We could never get any strait answers. We would have lost our home if I did not get VA involved.My husband lost his job. We have heard it all. What finally saved us was The VA.They will stand by the Loan. YOu can bargin with that. The Banks know the Va back the loans and they have to modify quickly. VA will look out for the Vets. They did us.

By: MK - Detroit, MI

MK - Detroit, MI — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 17:32:28 +0000

No it didn’t work. We ended up losing our home earlier this month. Countrywide ripped us off – Bank of America did the same and then it ended up with Wells Fargo. We sent in our paperwork and the *best* they could do is INCREASE our payment for six months to “catch up” HELLO YOU STUPID MORONS – one spouse lost their job and our income is 50% LESS! They could have helped, but I found out why they didn’t and someone better jump on this story…We had a FHA loan – 9.5% interest. They would not drop the interest or bring us into the 31% ratio (we could have paid that). GUESS WHAT – FHA loans come with a federal guarantee to cover losses if the borrower defaults – so WHY WOULD A BANK WORK WITH YOU? THEY WILL STILL GET THEIR MONEY! CNN PLEASE LOOK INTO THIS. Maybe all FHA borrower’s who lost their homes can SUE the damn banks who stole our lives. ANY LAWYERS out ther who want to start a class action suit? It sure sounds like a scam to me.

By: Dawn

Dawn — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 01:19:35 +0000

Wow…after reading this news article and the comments that a friend sent today I have one question. Did anyone have a good experience with a bank assisting them? There must be someone that can help with this process before I lose my house or I crack from the stress. My story is very similar to many of you. Lost my job..working for less..single mom with 2 kids and dead beat dad..been sending in paperwork for 10 months and have just fought off 2 foreclosures. I’ve owned my current home for 15 years and been a homeowner paying mortgages for 25 with not one late payment. Seriously..very anal about paying my bills on time. I called the bank before I ran into trouble in Jan. before I paid my 1st late payment. I had been out of work and barely had grocery money. They said no programs but to check back in Feb after Obama puts his program into effect. So I did and I had to keep submitting paperwork over and over (the same paperwork) and they keep telling me they are working on it. After 7 months I did get a response from the bank (IndyMac) with a signed agreement that I need to pay 3 payments on time while they work on my account. I agree and fed ex the 1st payment and make the other 2 on time..only during this time the foreclosure notice hits the papers and now have my friends calling me to see if they can help. I am still waiting to hear IF they can help and they keep telling me to keep making the payments and it could take up to 5 months. I see alot of foreclosure notices in the papers and get sooooo pissed off cuz the banks have the money and are sitting on their asses and not helping people out like they were supposed to. In the meantime..property values are still plummeting as every foreclosure has a negative effect as well as an emotional one for the families that live there and have to live through it. Does anyone have any ideas of who might give a shit in the white house to call cuz I can tell you that noone at IndyMac cares.

By: Vicki Rockford, IL

Vicki Rockford, IL — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 00:45:38 +0000

12 years go I was a homeless mother of a young child. I worked my way up from being homeless to obtaining my own apartment and 3 1/2 years ago bought my 1st house in the hope of when my son was old enough to go to college, I would have a little investment in my home and be able to help send him to college. In May of 2008 I had to be off of work for 12 weeks due to a surgery. I had planned ahead for a 6 week medical leave. When it turned into 12 weeks, I notified Citimortgage. I requested a 3 month moritorium and filed paperwork with them via the phone for I could not write. After 40 phone calls, I found out that Citimortgage had never processed my request and refused to accept my payments. I was going to be forclosed on. I, like may others, proceeded to go through the long drawn out process to obtain a modification. After having them file forclosure paperwork and 250+ phone calls on my part, they finally got to a point where we were able to talk about a modification. In April 2009, I received all of the modification paperwork, sent in my payment and signed paperwork and I really thought that we had finally reached the end of the 10 month journey through mortgage hell. I was wrong. My payment was not applied to my account correctly and a escrow analysis had not been done proir to the modification being finalized. 5 days after reciving my 1st payment,Citimortgage had raised my monthly requirements to $50.00 per month to cover escrow expenses. Come to find out after another 75+ phone calls was that the funds had been put into unapplied and are sitting in the account collecting dust while I collect additional fees. My mistake was to believe that the people working at Citimortgage are competent. I have found 1 person since June 2009 until now that has a clue as to what needed to be done to get my account corrected and have the funds applied like they were supposed to be. He also has run into a wall and I continue to pay as per my modification arraingement, but now they are stating I am 3 months behind again. I can’t win. I only want to pay my mortgage but Citimortgage’s employees can’t figure out how to correct an error that they admit verbally is there and had been done on their part and now I may lose my house all over again. I receive a call from Citimortgage collections everyday, I respond with the same 15 minute reasoning and request for a supervisor to call me back. I have received 3 supervisor calls and my account gets reassigned every week to someone new, I finally get to that person and it then gets reassigned to someone named Beverly who’s job it appears to be is to sit on the account until she gets a phone message then have the account transferred to another person again. Beverly has been assigned to my account on more that 25 different occations and fails to return any calls back. Now Citimortgage says I am 3 months behind again and I can’t get them to fix an accounting error. According to HUD’s website, the company was supposed to have run an escrow analysis when the modification was agreed upon and was supposed to have waived all the late fees. They failed to do so. I don’t know what to do to get this corrected. I just want to pay my mortgage. How can I get Citimortgage to respond and correct their error. Do I have to pursue them in court? I am tired of feeling like my only resourse is to sue them.

By: al PICO RIVERA CA

al PICO RIVERA CA — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 20:12:56 +0000

After LITERALLY BEGGING FOR 11 MONTHS TO GET A LOAN MODIFICATION WELLS FARGO FINALLY CONCEDED AND LOWERED MY PAYMENT $78 FOR A HOUSE 200000 UPSIDE DOWN (I NEEDED $800 LOWERED) I HAVE PAID 2 MONTHS BUT AM TIRED OF TRYING TO KEEP THE HOME.EVEN FILING BK WAS DENIED CAUSE I HAVE A RETIREMENT INCOME AND CAN PAY 50000 IN CC DEBT. I WILL DEFAULT AND WONT EVEN TALK TO THE BANK EVER EVER EVER AGAIN. I WILL WAIT FOR THE MARSHALL TO GIVE ME 3 DAYS TO MOVE THAN I WILL RENT A U-HAUL AND LOAD UP IN ONE DAY. I WILL PAY A LANDLORD THE WHOLE 1 YEAR LEASE FOR A 1500 CONDO INSTEAD OF THE 3100 A MONTH FOR AN UPSIDE DOWN HOME WHICH WILL TAKE 10 YEARS TO REACH ITS VALUE HOME OWNERSHIP DREAMS IN THE USA ARE GONE FOR ME ITS OK THOUGH UPKEEP TAXES INSURANCES FORGET IT 4 EVER