Recent changes to the Federal Guidelines have imposed new protections for consumers dealing with the companies that allegedly own and service their mortgages. These new regulations require the Lender or the Servicer to provide a single point of contact. The purpose is to prevent the Homeowner from being switched and transferred from numerous representatives while trying to seek assistance with their loans.
I am an attorney. I represent a number of homeowners facing foreclosure. I deal with Lenders and Servicers on a regular basis. The frustration each Homeowner going through this process is not an individual occurrence, coincidence, the result of the sheer volume of cases. In my opinion, it is purposesful and calculated to cause as many homeowners to be overwhelmed and frustrated and eventually walk away from their home.
Here, is a short list of the issues caused by Lenders and Servicers that I have encountered repeatedly:
1. You must be at least 3 months behind in your payments before we can assist you with a modification;
2. Your financial documents are out of date;
3. We did not recieve your loan modification application;
4. You did not qualify for HAMP;
5. Your trial payments must be in certified funds;
6. Your trial payments were not received on time;
7. You do not need to answer the complaint as the modification will resolve the issues;
8. You do not need an attorney as the modification will resolve everything;
9. You do not need to attend the default hearing as we are working on a loan modification.
Now the Lenders and Servicers are attempting over burden attorneys and frustrate attorneys representing Homeowners facing foreclosure by providing a single point of contact listing only the property address. If you call the single point of contact with the property address they are not allowed to give out any information unless you know the name of the Homeowner. (The reason I was calling was to find out the name of teh Homeowner.). All I need to know is which file to put the letter in. I already have a single point of contact; opposing counsel.
Well the strategy worked. I was frustrated long enough to post these comments. However, I am not ready to walk away from any of the Homeowners. The point of my writing is to again encourage Homeowners to continue to fight. Do not allow Lenders and Servicers to frustrate you until you give up. This is also another reason why Homeowners should contact an attorney. I cannot understand why Homeowners attempt to defend the biggest asset they will most likely ever purchase on their own. Not only is this a complicated area of law, litigation itself can be complicated. At a minimum you need an attorney who is well versed in litigation. An attorney who is familar with many of the defenses and issues involved in foreclosure may be more helpful, but the point is that you must defend the foreclosure. You must be prepared to file an appeal if you lose at the trial court level. It has been my experience that the more you are willing to fight, the more likely the Lender will eventually work with you to reach an outcome that is beneficial.
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