To anyone with an in house Loan Mod with Bank of America

[willsurvive]

Hello,

We received an in house loan mod in August of Bank of America. Everything has been signed, etc., and we've made 2 payments as agreed. I guess my question is this. How long did it take for you to start receiving payment coupons and/or have online access to start accessing your account? I don't think I'll rest easy until all seems well with paperwork etc., and I can visually see my payments being applied etc. Also, we originally were set to go to Sale, Nov 1st. Supposedly this was stopped, but like I said, I'm not sure I'll believe it, until I see it.

Thanks!

[tigerman]

what kind of a mod do you get?

[Poorhouse64]

I tried to get a loan mod from BofA more than a year ago (7 months prior to filing BK). TODAY I got a letter from BofA denying my loan mod because BofA is merely "servicers" of my original loan (now discharged in BK & not re-affirmed). This is news to me !!! The letter said the "group of investors" did not permit BofA from granting a loan modification.

So my question to you is: did you ever see the actual promissory note? Are you sure BofA has the authority to modify the loan or are they merely "servicers"?

[tigerman]

I go see my lawyer Oct 19 to sign my petition for BK, I've been in a mod process for about a year and half now. The whole process is a joke, its at the point I dont care which way it goes. We want to keep the house but I'm not going to go through anymore BS with BofA once we file.

[willsurvive]

Poorhouse,

Did you have a signed agreement? Were you making payments as agreed in the loan mod?

Obviously I'm nervous, but we are hoping all goes through and have nothing to go off of other than trusting BofA . . . .which is hard. If we don't pay at all, then it's definite foreclosure, if we pay, the hope of a loan mod. We also are looking at is that we have to pay rent somewhere, so if it means keeping our house, we will continue to pay in hopes that the loan mod is a done deal. Time will tell....

[willsurvive]

I was really hoping someone with a done loan mod would chime in . . . SMinGA, where are you, lol?

[LizardTail]

Ok, I'll chime in. It's a long story, so I'll try to keep it brief. I applied for a loan modification about 18 months ago. At the time I applied, I was current on my mortgage, the representative told me to skip a month (I've heard this story 1,000 times from people trying to get a mod.). So I skipped a month to get behind and the trial payments were less than my regular payment. I made the trial payments on time and after three months, I called to find out about the permanent modificaiton. No such thing was gonna happen! Over the next year, they kept requesting more and more documents, updated this and that. During that year, almost everything in my life had changed. I got laid off and was having trouble financially. However, I was still making the trial payment amounts on my home.

Then about 5 weeks ago, I got a certified letter of the intent to foreclose if I didn't come up with over $10K. I freaked. I came up with about $8 of it and paid that in, and by this time, there was another payment due plus their fees for whatever they wanted. I had exhausted just about every place I could for finding extra $$$. Then, totally out of the blue LAST WEEK. I came home and found a FED EX at my door from BOA. It contained documents for a permament modification. A true modification. It reduced my mortgage payment about $200 a month, lowered the interest rate from 5.5% to 3.5% for 5 years, then to 4.5% for the remainder of the loan and it rolled the arrerages back into the principle.

I was to send in one month of the new payment with the new signed Loan Modiciation Agreement. They enclosed a FED EX return envelope. I mailed that in TODAY. I have no idea what prompted BOA to send a true final modification. In all honesty, I'm even STILL skeptical about all of it. After almost 2 years of haggling with them and being on hold, transferred to this and that department and continually being rejected, it baffles me why this modification showed up. The only reason I can think of is that I paid a large chunck of the amount due and the current problems BOA is having with its modiciation and its having to hault foreclosures.

That's it in a nutshell. Probably sounds much easier than it was, but it has been a living hell for the past 2 years. The state of our economy, unemployment, etc., has me very shaky! [Did not proof-read, so sorry for any typos].

[LizardTail]

HOWEVER, I JUST received a phone call from BOA regarding the option of a "Short Sale" of my home. See, I'm very leery of BOA. I told the person calling that I had sent in my paperwork for a final modification and she said she would quit calling. For all the people they hire to collect debts, they could use that money to help people! Didn't Obama sign a simulus just for that purpose, to help homeowners? Are the banks using that money to hire debt collector?????

[Poorhouse64]

I tried to get a loan mod from BofA more than a year ago (7 months prior to filing BK). TODAY I got a letter from BofA denying my loan mod because BofA is merely "servicers" of my original loan (now discharged in BK & not re-affirmed). This is news to me !!! The letter said the "group of investors" did not permit BofA from granting a loan modification.

So my question to you is: did you ever see the actual promissory note? Are you sure BofA has the authority to modify the loan or are they merely "servicers"?

***************
In reference to my earlier posting, the letter I received was my 1st notice that BofA was not going to grant my loan modification. We had been "working" with them for over a year on a loan mod and as recent as July, they said everything was moving along.....silly me thought I could get a loan mod. NOW I find out they were only servicers and have NO AUTHORITY to grant loan modifications. So, in a sense I'm very glad I didn't sign any "loan modification paperwork" with this bank. They don't own the note. It's anyone's guess who actually DOES own the note at this point.

After the enormous financial stress of the past 2 years, going totally broke, worrying myself to the point of hospitalization, I GLAD I FILED BANKRUPTCY and even more happy that I didn't re-affirm this house. I know we won't be able to make the payments (we are still current) forever because we are flat broke. We are simply one broken car, or one hospital bill away from being behind on our house (non re-affirmed rent) payment........ at least the debt behind it has been discharged. We were hoping to keep the house based upon a dream....that someday it might be worth what we paid into it ...... I seriously doubt we will ever see a return on this "investment" 2007.... and we scrape by each month just to feed the kids. 100% house poor even after bankruptcy !!!! I would love to stop paying entirely..... but I worry about foreclosure and finding a rental. I have kids at home.......

[LizardTail]

Your story really saddens me. We are not in very different situations EXCEPT you have children at home and I do not. It almost appears as your case may be one of the cases that is heavily involved in the foreclosure mess. Though I don't see it now, in the news, but there may be help for you down the road in the sense that your mortgage will get straighted out. I understand completely about "who owns the note."

My original loan was with Countrywide. I specifically did not accept BOA's loan proposal, yet I ended up with them. I also understand about being one problem away from total disaster. I currently have under $500 in the bank and am scheduled for a $600 medical test tomorrow. I have $200 on my food stamps. I, as you, am literally sick with all of this. I'm glad I filed BK, because adding $50K of debt on my -$100 checking account would probably do me in.

I have sold everything I can think of to sell. It's even hard to sell stuff because everyone is selling their own stuff. The only job I have been able to get is at a grocery store for $10 per hour. I used to make $60K a year. At that job, I would have been paid to take the day off for the $600 medical test, but no, not this time. I won't even be making my little $10.00 an hour while that $600 is drained into my veins.

So, I'm probably just about as bitter as you are. Hang in there, hopefully things will get better. [Don't you hate to hear things like that?]

[willsurvive]

LizardTail, my story is very similar to yours. . .

We filed bk in 12/08, did not reaffirm our home AND stopped paying completely. We figured a loan mod was a pipe dream after one year of hearing nothing about it (all the while making no payments). We were 100% ready to walk figuring there was absolutely NO WAY they could mod our loan with late payments, etc. Finally 18 months after filing and not paying our mortgage, BofA starts foreclosure. They send us paperwork in July 2010 for HAMP saying to just fill it out to see if we qualify. I fill it all out "for the heck of it". Well, suprisingly, a week goes by and then a FedEx comes with an in house modification offer. Basically it's 2.5% for 5 years, 3% for year 6, 4% for years 7-8 and then 4.25% for the life of the loan (40 years). All our late payments were rolled back in which sucks, but oh well. We were 100% ready to walk and planning on a rent payment of $1200 - $1500/month starting in November of this year. Well, the loan mod is exactly $1225 for 5 years, and then eases it's way up to $1500 for the remainder. To us it's a no brainer . . . . we have to rent SOMEWHERE, so why not our own home that we built with our two hands. I too am very leery of Bank of America. I don't trust them . . . . but what else left can I do? If I stop paying, the chance of this offered loan mod is definitely out, so we will pay. I'm praying that my online account starts reflecting the terms, but I'm not freaking out yet because it took almost 2 years to get us where we our with our loan now . . . so we will be patient. We have made 2 payments to them, every one of them was sent certified mail, and a cashiers check. They have accepted both, but I still haven't got any communication from BofA that everything is peachy. On the other hand, we have received no negative information either, and all the documents that we were receiving about the pending foreclosure has stopped too.

And by the way, let's say this loan mod doesn't work out. The terms in it didn't "reaffirm" the debt in anyway, so we are free to go at any time and walk away without a deficiency. This is not our plan, but it feels good to have the ball in our court right now. Good luck to everyone, hopefully things work out for each of you. This has been very stressful and I"m sure will continue, but for now, we feel pretty blessed.