It's the loan modification bait and switch...
- "We won't consider your case if you're current on your mortgage."
- "Now that you are behind on your payment, we have denied your modification, and have started foreclosure."
- Thank you for banking with JP Morgan Chase."
What's shocking, well maybe not so much for Jamie Dimon's operation, is that they did this to a judge.
Even more shocking? That Bank of America didn't do it first.
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Ohio Judge Follows JPMorgan's Advice, Ends up in Foreclosure
Source - Cleveland Plain Dealer
Ohio Judge Peter Sikora was looking to take advantage of the lowest mortgage interest rates in decades and refinance his eight-bedroom, lakefront Cleveland home, so he contacted his bank, JPMorgan Chase. With property values in decline in Cleveland, Chase said no to refinancing but told the judge to apply for a loan modification instead. The judge followed JPMorgan Chase’s advice to the letter and as a result has fallen a year behind on his nearly $1 million mortgage… hasn’t paid his property taxes… and now has ended up in foreclosure.
- "The bank advised me that the only way they would consider a loan modification would be if I fell behind on my payments," said Sikora, 59, a judge since 1989. "I took their advice and put the money aside."
Sikora said he was surprised when, in June, during the middle of negotiations, JP Morgan Chase filed the foreclosure lawsuit against him seeking $999,000, including $6,400 in unpaid property taxes.
"It's unfortunate that it's gotten to this situation," Sikora said. "I've been talking with them for more than a year, but the bank hasn't been responsive."
The attorney for JP Morgan Chase did not return a phone call.
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Third-quarter HAMP trials plunge 84% from year ago
The Treasury Department's Home Affordable Modification Program is dwindling.
According to data released last week from the Office of the Comptroller Currency, lenders started 43,739 new, three-month HAMP trials in the third quarter, down 84% from the peak of 272,709 a year ago.
New trials have been on the decline ever since lenders reported, on average, 57,000 fewer trials than the quarter before. The biggest drop came in first quarter of 2010, when lenders offered 118,000 fewer trials than the previous quarter.
"I think the program is turning out to have a lot less impact on the market than we thought it would have," said Sen. Ted Kaufman (D-Del.), chairman of Congressional Oversight Panel after it released a scathing report on HAMP last month.
http://www.housingwire.com/2011/01/03/third-quarter-hamp-trials-plunge-84-from-year-ago
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Treasury's Incredible Shrinking Mortgage Mod Program
Banks have had a poor record of modifying mortgages under the government program.
- Check out our graphical breakdown of each bank's performance.
Homeowners report Kafka-esque experiences of lost paperwork, miscommunication and dashed hopes in trying to get help preventing foreclosures.
We've recently chronicled homeowner experiences in a series of profiles and a questionnaire. Investors who own mortgages are dismayed as well.
The Treasury Department has yet to penalize a single mortgage servicer since the program launched last spring.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/propublica/treasurys-incredible-shri_b_774985.html
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Amid Foreclosure Questions, Govt Loan Mod Program Continues
http://www.propublica.org/article/amid-foreclosure-questions-govt-loan-mod-program-continues-struggles
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Bank Of America Stands Out For Poor HAMP Performance
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/09/27/bank-of-america-stands-ou_n_740223.html
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Lawsuits Reflect Widespread Frustration With Government's Mortgage Modification Program
A federal judicial panel recently consolidated class-action lawsuits from across the country alleging that Bank of America treated homeowners with bad faith when they applied for mortgage modifications under the Obama administration's Home Affordable Modification Program.
"What this demonstrates is that homeowners across this country have grown frustrated with Bank of America's inability to comply with regulations put out by HAMP," Ira Rheingold, director of the National Association of Consumer Advocates, told HuffPost.
Under HAMP, the Treasury Department gives mortgage servicers $1,000 incentive payments to reduce borrowers' monthly payments, mostly by cutting interest rates. If an eligible borrower makes his or her reduced payments for three or four months during a trial period, the modification is supposed to become permanent. Often, trials drag on for much longer.
"Rather than allocating adequate resources and working diligently to reduce the number of loans in danger of default by establishing permanent modifications, Bank of America has serially strung out, delayed and otherwise hindered the modification processes that it contractually undertook to facilitate when it accepted billions of dollars from the United States," says the complaint seeking class action filed in July by Teresa Follmer of Mesa, Ariz.
Follmer's suit is one of eight putative class actions that will be consolidated as one case in federal court in Massachusetts. Bank of America supports the consolidation, according to ProPublica, which first reported the consolidation.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/10/19/lawsuits-reflect-widespre_n_768368.html
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Now watch this excellent clip...
Video - Yves Smith on The Real News
- "Mortgage service industry makes more money from foreclosures than from restructuring debt."
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