Good for the Goose & Good for the Gosling
Once upon a time Mother Goose ran a big commercial bank that made home mortgage loans. She did well and had quite a number of nest eggs. Then one of them hatched and wanted to be just like her. ‘Oh my dear, it is a very difficult market right now,’ she warned. ‘How about you go off and become a nice attorney instead.’ Yet despite his mother’s honking, you Gosling Junior went out and made a private home loan to the first buyer he could find who was breathing. He did everything just the way he had imprinted from his mother, including the loan interest calculation. That was all very well and good, except he failed to disclose his methods. Sure enough, just as Mother Goose had warned him, the home loan market was tough and Gosling Junior’s borrower started missing payments. The Gosling went to foreclose and that is when he got his feathers ruffled. The Judge agreed that the borrower owed money, but the homeowner cried foul when it came to the interest calculations. The borrower accused Gosling of mallard-justed interest calculations. ‘Yes, but they are the standard calculations used by commercial banks,’ Gosling tried to explain. The [...] Read More
Charmed Life–Not!
A ‘short sale’ does not mean the buyer is a Leprechaun. It means the lender agrees to accept less than the mortgage balance. The lender gets a smaller amount than what is owed, but generally more than if the property went into foreclosure. You are not going to find a pot of gold from a short sale, but you may come out with more credit than you would at the end of a foreclosure rainbow. Just because you are facing foreclosure does not mean you are out of options, and a short sale may be one of them, depending on your circumstances. You can count on your lucky charms to avoid foreclosure, or you can talk to a defense attorney about how to best address it. Read More
Short Sale Scene
A Short Sale transaction is one where the proceeds of the sale of the property will not completely pay off the loan on the property and the lender agrees to accept a ‘short’ payoff. A Short Sale is not the ideal situation, but if the homeowner is facing foreclosure on an upside down property, a Short Sale can bring the best benefit for the homeowner by reducing loss of credit and getting them out from beneath a mortgage they cannot pay for. Below is a general list of documents many lenders require with the Short Sale offer: Hardship Letter (detailed letter of your financial struggle) Pay Stubs from the last two months Tax Returns of the most recent two years Monthly Budget Statement (monthly expenses) Bank Statements from the last two months (checking and savings accounts) If Self-Employed, Profit and Loss Financial Statement Property Owners’ Association Contact Information Finding a buyer, negotiating with the lender, and getting the deal done is not an easy process and it is not a quick or ‘short’ process. The Short Sale scene can be a very long act. Read More
Home for the Holidays…And Beyond
If you have not made a mortgage payment in a while, that might not be Saint Nick knocking at the door. You could be on your lender’s naughty list. Do not look for a fruitcake with a foreclosure summons. Just because you sent Santa a letter does not mean he is going to deliver a Mortgage Modification before you get a foreclosure package from your lender. If you have received a Foreclosure Lawsuit, do not wait until after the holidays to address it. Your time is limited. Seek competent legal counsel to make a proper response to the court summons. Read More
For We Like Sheep…Foreclosure Defense
“For we like sheep have gone astray” may sound nice in The Messiah, but it does not do much for a loan modification or short sale. In negotiating with your lender, quoting Handel is right up there with “The check is in the mail” and “The dog ate my mortgage payment.” Having trouble going to sleep at night? Try counting foreclosures. In November there were 29,612 foreclosure notices issued in Florida. That is a lot of sheep. About one in every 300 housing units received a foreclosure notice statewide. But herd mentality does not necessarily have to apply. Do not let your lender pull the wool over your eyes. Everyone should pay his mortgage, but a lot has happened in recent years. Lenders have made improper assignments of mortgage…and lied about them. We have seen the handwriting on the wall scrawled by robo-signers who move more in penmanship than verification. You may be among the flock, but a Foreclosure Defense is an opportunity to address your case as an individual, and use legal guidance to knit a custom strategy towards the best benefit. Do not let your rights go astray. Seek competent legal counsel to shepherd your resources towards an [...] Read More
Best Laid Schemes of Mice & Men
Read Steinbeck lately? Or maybe John Lennon: “Life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans.” Sometimes foreclosure happens while you were planning on a short sale. You can understand how medical hardship, unemployment, and loss of income lead to stress on your mortgage payment. The logical disconnect happens when you have everything lined up for a short sale—the buyer is ready, the bank has approved—and you get a foreclosure summons anyway. If everybody is so pleased with the deal, why are you receiving a lawsuit? Being in the midst of a short sale will not stop a foreclosure procedure. The lending department does not talk to the legal department. Both move forward on your case, the former on the short sale, and the latter on the lawsuit—it is a race to see which happens first. Either you accomplish the short sale or you get sued, regardless of whether you are a mouse or a man. You have options. You can squeak and run away, or you can stand up to the foreclosure with a legal defense, and try to get the short sale done before the foreclosure happens. Sometimes a foreclosure defense is useful to address [...] Read More
Closet Space
High-end real estate is trading on closet space. For those who have everything, they need somewhere to put it, and what spells luxury better than an acreage of outfits you can only wear once? Going for $60,000 up to a half million dollars, the walk-in closet remodeled into a live-in dressing suite is all the rage for high-end homeowners. On the lower end of the housing market, increased closet space has an advantage too. For homes with closets large enough to live in, they can be converted into rentable rooms, offering affordable housing to those recently bereft of a mortgage, or those needing to consolidate multi-generational mortgage payments under one roof. The popularity of renting has increased along with higher mortgage mortalities. Payments on an upside down mortgage may be as practical as cufflinks made of cheese, thus prompting distressed homeowners to short sell their homes in favor of more affordable abodes…and that can mean renting (especially as preferable to pitching a tent in foreclosure land or sleeping under the stars of bankruptcy). If you are struggling to make a mortgage payment, examine your legal options with a competent attorney to determine what is best for you…even if you have [...] Read More
Foreclosure Strategy: When to Walk Away…When to Run
Foreclosure options are like poker hands: some are better than others…and you have to play the hand you are dealt. Strategic default has become more popular in recent years, gaining social acceptance, transforming a ‘walk away of shame’ into a ‘smart move.’ Why spend hours on the phone with your lender when you could live in a luxury condo on cheap rent, eating out on the money you save by not having to ante upside down into a mortgage? However, what seems like a good idea in the short run may not be so ‘strategic’ in the long term. The long arm of the Office of the Inspector General (OIG) at the Federal Housing Finance (FHFA) reaches nationwide. They are coming after bad lenders and strategic defaulters alike…and they have guns. If you walk away when you could pay, you may be Wanted. (Makes ‘bankruptcy’ sound so much more attractive!) The best strategy is the well-thought-out strategy, weighing your personal and financial circumstances with your legal options to find a course that brings the best benefit to you fastest. You are not going to beat the bank and win a free house. Ultimately, the house always wins and takes your [...] Read More
Robo-Signers Signing Checks in Foreclosure Settlement
The robo-signers are getting ready to write settlement checks to their foreclosure victims. Nearly all the states in the Union and D.C. sued the five largest mortgage servicers for “misconduct [which] resulted in the issuance of improper mortgages, premature and unauthorized foreclosures, violation of service members’ and other homeowners’ rights and protections, the use of and false and deceptive affidavits and other documents, and the waste and abuse of taxpayer funds” (Case 1:12-cv-00361-RMC Document 4-1)…and they won. The lawsuit paid out $25 billion nationally, with Florida’s portion set at $8.4 billion, some of which went directly to the State and some will go to loan modifications, leaving $170 million to be paid out in cash to Florida borrowers. With a current roster of 167,398 eligible Florida borrowers on the list, each stands to receive about $1,000 if divided evenly and depending on how many of them participate. To be eligible for a check signed by a robo-signer, you have to have lost your house to foreclosure between January 1, 2008 and December 31, 2011 with your mortgage serviced by Bank of America, JP Morgan Chase, Wells Fargo, Citigroup, or Ally Financial. Postcards went out last week to those on the [...] Read More
Some Like It Cheap
Bankruptcy is not for everybody. Neither is foreclosure. Some homeowners may be better suited in a loan modification program, while others would benefit most from a short sale. Modern room rates at the Waldorf Astoria in New York start in the $300’s, but some couples can enjoy the famous hotel’s hospitality for only $16.80 per night. If you are old enough to have a reverse mortgage, you could be eligible for 1950’s pricing at the Waldorf. However, though you might benefit from room service at the Waldorf, certain conditions apply: it had to be your honeymoon and you have to have the 1950’s hotel receipt…and you have to still be alive. Similarly, certain conditions apply to various debt resolutions plans for homeowners. No single solution is going to fit everybody. There is an assortment of options, which differ in eligibility and benefit for homeowners, depending on their situations. Seek competent legal counsel to review the options available to you, and which would bring the best advantage given your circumstances. Read More