I spoke with you yesterday over the phone, and thank you for that!! I am going to give you the information you've requested, as well as a brief description of what has happened.
First of all my loan # is 1407308555, we bought this home in XXX of 2008. We have NEVER even been a day late on ANY of our payments, no matter what has been the situation, even up to today! I worked as a cabinet maker for several years up until Jan 15th of 20XX. At that time I was laid off from my job because there was just not enough work to keep everyone in our shop busy. We went from 37 employee's down to 5 in a matter of weeks. Between recieving unemployment and our savings, we were able to pay our mortgage every month (on time keep in mind!!) for about 4-5 months....then things started getting a little slim!! We decided to request a loan modification to try and lower our interest rate, make our payment more manageable, and KEEP OUR HOME!! I did some research through some government program websites and then spoke to Wells Fargo to request the action I needed to take to get this program rolling. They sent me a simple income/expense form along with a request for a "hardship letter". My wife and I promtly filled out the form, wrote the letter and sent it back. Our normal mortgage payment was $1317.00 a month, due on the 1st of every month at this point. I called Wells Fargo several times in the months of October & November 09 and was told they were in the process of reviewing our paperwork. Finally I called on the 1st of December 09 to see if they had any news....and they did!!! The lady told me that they were able to approve our modification for 4 months to reduce our payment to $1115.00 NOW DUE ON DEC. 24th instead of the 1st. I specifically asked if this would hurt our credit and if we were going to have to pay the balance back at ANY POINT. I was told "NO ABSOLUTELY NOT" she said that at the end of the 4 month period, as long as we made all 4 payments on time, our account would be reviewed again and we can expect our payment to get EVEN LOWER. Of course my wife and I were excited about this, we could make a more manageable payment, and what better timing than right before Christmas since we have two children!!!! Keep in mind I had been laid off from my job where I brought home about $500-700 a week, and only had been able to find part time work at Sears where I was only bringing home anywhere from $100-350 a week at best!!
All went well for the months of December, January, Feburary, and March. We made all of our payments of $1115.00 on time every month. I was even able to find a better job towards the end of Feburary with Honda, and continued to work a little bit at Sears to help us catch up from the HORRIBLE YEAR OF 2009!!! Then came the phone call on Monday 4-19-10. I got an automated message from Wells Fargo saying that I need to contact them immediately concerning an important matter.
WELLS FARGO USES YOUR REQUEST TO MODIFY YOUR MORTGAGE AS THEIR OPPORTUNITY TO BEGIN THE FORECLOSURE PROCESS
AND STEAL YOUR HOME
I called them and a lady said that it was just a reminder call that we have a payment due on 4-24 of $2800!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I told her that there must be some kind of mistake and to make sure she was looking at the right account. She verified all of my information again, and confirmed that they were requesting a "balloon payment" and that they were technically showing our account as 2 months delinquent!!!!! I said again that she must not be looking at the right account and asked her to tell me what two months we missed, she was unable to do that. She had payments of the proper amount showing for EVERY month since the day we bought our house. I asked how could we possibly be behind when we have never been even LATE on a single payment???? She then went on to say that the 4 month "trial period" was just an agreement to accept "partial payments" NOT the government program MODIFICATION that we had requested!!! I immediately asked to speak to a supervisor, was put on hold for over 20 minutes and then disconnected.
I called back later the same day and spoke to someone different. He tried telling me the same B.S. and that we needed to write a new letter of hardship and RE FILE new paperwork if we wanted to try to get a modification!?!? I explained to him that I was told we were already in a "modification". He then said that we should have documents outlining this " payment plan" and the balloon payment, but we had NEVER recieved any type of paperwork, just the conversation that I had with the woman in December of 09. I asked him to review the conversation I had with her ( I know they record their calls!)
(YES, HE IS ABSOLUTELY RIGHT, WELLS FARGO DOES RECORD THEIR CALLS, AND I WOULD ENCOURAGE EVERY SINGLE ONE OF YOU TO DO THE SAME THING!!! REVIEW YOUR STATE'S STATUTES ON PHONE RECORDING. FEEL FREE TO e-mail me: ctsmyhon@yahoo.com AND I WILL FORWARD YOUR STATE'S LAWS TO YOU. IN KANSAS ONLY ONE PARTY (me!) TAKING PART IN THE CONVERSATION MUST KNOW THE CALL IS BEING RECORDED (as opposed to neither, if for instance, someone was recording the calls made to and from a home and neither party taking part in the conversation was aware of it) SO I LEGALLY CAN RECORD EVERY SINGLE CALL. THIS IS IMPORTANT EVIDENCE TO HAVE FOR USE IN A TRIAL.) He said, he could not do that. ............So once again....I asked for his boss!!! The "boss" got on the phone and said there was nothing he could do except give me a couple of fax nubers that I can fax a "request to continue modification" to. I asked to get an actual phone number of someone in that "negotiators department" and was told that they will not work by phone......I can only fax them a request to get in contact with me!!!?????
Thats where it stands today. I have a mortgage payment due in 3 days, and am at a complete loss of what avenue to take. I am assuming I should make my normal mortgage payment of $1317.00 instead of their "hoax modification" payment of $1115.00. And I am planning on faxing them the requests today also. This whole thing has been very misleading, time consuming, and troublesome. For us to be outstanding mortgage customers and to be treated this way is BAFFLING!!!!!!! I am really hoping that you can help us out on getting this whole thing taken care of, and I really appreciate any information you can get for me.
Thank You,
Jeremy BXXX
1234 W. Artist Dr.
Cost de XXX, XX XXXXX
Jeremy,
ReplyDeletePlease don't give up. Same thing happened to me. Call the WF executives Kelly has listed here. Insist they rescind late charges. Just keep pushing them. I was denied twice, and found out accidentally my mod was rescinded after five months of trial payments and verbal confirmation of permanent mod approval. I was eventually offered an in house modification and accepted it. Making my first official payment May 1. Still owe escrow and no one can tell me the terms of that payoff. Keeping my fingers crossed they don't ask for a lump sum. In the end, my monthly payment was reduced by $300.00. Not worth heartache and insanity of the whole nightmare. And I am one of the lucky ones.