Home Affordable Modification Program

Wells Fargo private mods outnumber HAMP 5 to 1

July 2, 2011 By Steve Dibert Leave a Comment

Jon Prior, Housing Wire

Wells Fargo completed or started trials on roughly 585,000 mortgage modifications through its private programs since the beginning of 2009, more than five times the 101,000 initiated through the Home Affordable Modification Program.

HAMP launched in March 2009 but almost immediately drew criticism. Treasury officials admit the more than 3 million modifications initially promised was over estimated. Through May, servicers started roughly 731,000 permanent loan modifications and have been averaging between 25,000 and 30,000 per month this year.

According to a recent poll of housing counselors, only 9% of borrowers who entered the program described it as a “positive” experience.

Homeowners continually blame servicers for mishandling documentation. Overwhelmed servicers point out many borrowers are simply out of reach.

“Avoiding foreclosure is a top priority for us and when customers work with us, we can help seven of every 10 to stay out of foreclosure,” said Teri Schrettenbrunner, senior vice president, Wells Fargo Home Mortgage.

Filed Under: Mortgage News Tagged With: economic meltdown, financial crisis, foreclosure, foreclosure crisis, foreclosure defense, foreclosure help, foreclosure rescue, foreclosures, HAMP, Home Affordable Modification Program, Housing Crisis, Loan Modifications, Mortgage Crisis, mortgage fraud, mortgages, Wells Fargo

Homeowner Beats Bank Of America In Small Claims Court

January 4, 2011 By Steve Dibert 1 Comment

Arthur Delaney, Huffington Post

A California homeowner sued Bank of America in small claims court and won $7,595 from the bank after it burned him on a mortgage modification.

“It was a good victory for me and I think for homeowners around the country,” Dave Graham told HuffPost.

Graham, who lives in Big Bear City, Calif., applied for a loan modification under the Obama administration’s Home Affordable Modification Program, which is supposed to give eligible borrowers a “permanent” five-year modification if they make reduced payments during a three-month trial period.

Graham said his trial dragged on for 18 months. He said he made every payment until Bank of America told him in May that he didn’t qualify for HAMP, and that he’d lose his home unless he paid about $7,000 to make up the difference between his normal monthly payments and the reduced payments he made during the trial period.

“Each month when I did talk to them I was informed it’s still under review — as long as you keep making this trial payment everything will be fine,” said Graham, 53. “At some point I started receiving notices from my credit cards that they were reducing my credit amount due to recent problems making my mortgage payment on time.”

Bank of America mortgage service specialist Anthony Lopez admitted during a Dec. 15 hearing that the bank continued taking Graham’s payments even after Graham had no chance of getting a modification, according a transcript of the hearing provided by Alan Sims, a forensic real estate specialist who helped Graham make his case.

“People that do take these calls arenʼt letʼs say experienced or certified negotiators. They are collectors,” Lopez said, according to the transcript. “They have minimal training in the modification process.”

Treasury Admits It Hasn’t Fined Banks For Failing To Comply With HAMP

November 19, 2010 By Steve Dibert 3 Comments

William Alden, Huffington Post

A top Treasury department official said Thursday that the government has still not imposed any fines on banks that do not comply with the Obama administration’s mortgage modification program.

In testimony before a House Financial Services subcommittee, Phyllis Caldwell, chief of Treasury’s Homeownership Preservation Office, said her department has pursued “non-monetary remedies” but has not actually imposed any fines on banks for not complying with the administration’s flagship $50 billion foreclosure prevention program.

Even in the midst of a growing controversy over allegedly fraudulent foreclosure paperwork, Treasury has not imposed any penalties on banks.

By many estimates, the Home Affordable Modification Program, which was launched last year, has been a failure. Although about 1.5 million borrowers were encouraged to sign up during its first year, 40 percent of those were kicked out of the program after initiating “trial” modifications, HuffPost’s Shahien Nasiripour and Arthur Delaney reported. The program was intended to help up to 4 million homeowners avoid foreclosure.

In his latest report to Congress, the special inspector general for TARP Neil Barofsky said the mortgage-modification program can actually cause borrowers to go into foreclosure, due to extra fees that can accumulate on modified loans. The Government Accountability Office reported inMarch and in June not only that Treasury has not levied any fines on mortgage companies, but also that it hasn’t even finalized guidelines for doing so.

After bank officials admitted that they had employed people who approved foreclosure documents without reading them, big banks including JPMorgan Chase and Bank of America last month temporarily halted their foreclosures. A Federal task force is investigating whether there has been criminal activity in the mortgage industry, and Bank of America faces a Federal racketeering lawsuit over its allegedly shoddy paperwork.

Still, Treasury has not yet punished these banks in any significant way. “To date we have not gone back to take back incentives that have already been paid, but we have pursued many of the non-monetary remedies, including further actions and evaluations, and re-evaluations,” Caldwell told Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.), chair of the subcommittee on Housing and Community Opportunity, after Waters repeatedly asked her if she had “levied any penalties or sanctions.”

Filed Under: Mortgage Fraud News, Mortgage News Tagged With: Business News, Economic Crisis, HAMP, Home Affordable Modification Program, Maxine Waters, mortgage modification, mortgages, Phyllis-Caldwell, Treasury Department

Bank Of America Stands Out For Poor HAMP Performance

September 27, 2010 By Steve Dibert Leave a Comment

Arthur Delaney, Huffington Post

Bank of America stands out among the biggest mortgage servicers for an exceptionally poor performance under the Obama administration’s Home Affordable Modification Program, according to data recently released by the government.

The eight largest servicers have offered an alternative mortgage modification to 44.5 percent of homeowners whose HAMP modifications have been canceled, but Bank of America has offered alternate mods to only 24 percent of the 148,129 homeowners whose trial modifications the bank canceled. For homeowners denied trial modifications, 31.3 percent have been offered alternate modifications by the Big Eight. Bank of America has offered alternate mods to just 11 percent of these folks.

“Bank of America seems to be stubbornly refusing to go along with the program,” said Valparaiso University Law School professor Alan White, who first flagged Bank of America’s standout performance in a Public Citizen blog post.

“BofA has also mastered the art of false hopes,” wrote White. “It has converted only 26% of trial modifications to permanent ones, while servicers as a whole have achieved a rate of over 50% (still terrible, but it’s all relative.) Over half of BofA’s trial modifications are more than six months old, despite the fact that they are supposed to convert to permanent or be canceled after three months.”

Wells Fargo private mods outnumber HAMP 5 to 1

Homeowner Beats Bank Of America In Small Claims Court

Treasury Admits It Hasn’t Fined Banks For Failing To Comply With HAMP

Bank Of America Stands Out For Poor HAMP Performance

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