WELLS FARGO HOMEOWNERS DON'T HOLD YOUR BREATH

DAN HARRIS 

ON THE RECORD

Hi Mr. Goodman,

I was contacted by these folks in California who were looking for some advice. I was given their permission to forward their information to you and have included them in the cc: line, his phone number is at the bottom of the page.

As you can see from the timeline below the borrower has been run in circles by Wells Fargo.

This is typical of what the lenders are doing and not in keeping with HAMP guidelines. The lenders have very strong PR people who want the media to tell the public they are making great efforts in helping homeowners to keep their homes. The dismal performance in making HAMP modifications permanent does not bode well for their efforts.

The way the HAMP program is set up the lender gets a $1,500 payment from treasury when they put a borrower into HAMP trial modification (at this point they do not guarantee the homeowner anything), and in return for that the government gives them $1,500.00 – free money.

The next step in the process is for the lender to make the modification permanent; in return for this the lender gets another $1,500.00 payment from the government. Except at this point the lender has to guarantee the borrower something, and take a hit to their asset value. In other words this $1,500.00 comes with strings attached and isn’t nearly as attractive as the 1^st$1,500.00 payment.

Suffice it to say it appears that the HAMP trial period has been used by lenders and servicers to rake in the initial $1,500.00 government payment, with no strings attached. But when it comes to actually taking the reduction in their asset value - NO WAY. Lenders who ask for document after document after document BEFORE they put borrowers into the HAMP Trial Period, use the excuse that they relied upon “verbal” information to qualify the borrower into the trial period to justify denying the modification after the trial. This is baloney – they had the documents in hand BEFORE putting the borrower in the trial.

Many lenders who collect the $1,500.00 to put borrowers into a HAMP trial modification use every trick in the book to take them out of HAMP at the end. Then they offer the deflated borrower a life line - a “traditional” or “in house” modification which is much more profitable for the lender.

This practice should be exposed for the scam that it is.

Regards,

Dan Harris

Author of “How To Modify Your Mortgage”