Personal Story

Here is my story, from an insider’s point of view:

I have been in the mortgage industry for the last 15 years. I pride myself in always delivering the results I promise in the beginning of a transaction. You may not like what I have to say, but I always tell the truth no matter how hard it maybe for the client.
In fact during the busy days of mortgages, I lost a lot of clients to other loan officers that would promise clients everything and would tell them what they wanted to hear and not what the truth really was. In the long run they would come back to me to refi them out of the mess they put themselves into.

Well, when all these “EXOTIC” loans came about, and I am talking about all the “NO DOCS, LIMITED DOCS, ADJUSTABLE RATES, TEASER RATES, MTAs or OPTION ARM loans, I was trained on how to do them as every other loan officer was. There was a right way to do them and a wrong way. I once again chose to evaluate the client’s situation before I would recommend any of these loans, leading to losing more business to other loan officers.

Despite all that I was doing pretty well for myself and it seemed that honesty was the best policy. I had bought myself a small home with my wife and we were doing ok. As our family grew we found ourselves in need of more space and started to look for a bigger home. We found a great deal and after sitting down and coming up with a plan of action we preceded. Not too long after that, the market came crashing down. We found ourselves with less than half the income, not being able to sell our first home and in a total financial mess in what seemed overnight. After carrying two mortgages for more than a year, I decided to call the mortgage company and modify my loan. After all I was in the business, I knew what I was doing.

Well as it turned out doing mortgages and doing loan modifications are not the same, as I found out. I agreed to a modification that really only benefited the bank in getting more money out of me than truly helping me out. In a matter of a few months I was behind again. I decided to seek help from a modification company. I spent a lot of time on line doing my due diligence and finally chose 123 FIX MY LOAN. A company out of MA. I paid them $2700.00 and almost 7 months later they had accomplished nothing more than putting me further back on my payments and working out a worse modification with the bank than I originally had.
Part of the agreement they had worked out with the bank called for two payments upfront, $6850.00 and then increases in my payment of $325.00 for six months. After that period and if I had kept up with the payments they would proceed with the modification.
I totally lost it and I remember one night which it will always stay in memory, going to bed and not being able to sleep cause I felt my chest would cave in. I could not breath and I had such a panic attack that I thought I was dieing. I got out of bed @ 3:00am and started to do research and trying to come with a solution on line. I spent a few days searching, and the more I searched the more I learned.

I finally found out what a lot of people do not want to admit.
Banks and government are not here to protect you. The government is bailing out everyone except the people that are paying taxes and driving this great country of ours.
I found out that unless I fight this myself no one would help me.

I found out that there are laws and rights that the homeowners have to protect them from being foreclosed on.

I found out that while most of us are strapped for cash and we are going to the banks for help, so that we do not pay any other company to help us, we do exactly what the banks want us to.

They want us to negotiate for a loan modification with them, because they know that we are not equipped to do it right, putting more money in their pockets and just prolonging
the obvious, which is foreclosure.

If you do enough research on line you will see most folks that have done a modification are back where they were before it. I read a lot of posts, and it seems that most people are in denial and think the banks have the homeowner’s best interest at heart.

I consider myself lucky and I thank GOD every day that I found out a LEGAL and TRUE
Way to fight back. I am currently in court and suing my bank for all the fraud they have engaged in with my loan. My case was good enough to be taken on by APLAN and their attorneys so that when we reach a settlement with the bank it will be on my terms, and it will be permanent without them ever coming back to me for more money.

In some states CONSUMER FRAUD is a serious offense and you can be awarded TREBLE DAMAGES, which means triple damages. You think the bank will not bend over backwards once they are forced to mitigate or come to settlement?
In whatever everyone on here decides to do good luck with your due diligence.

GOD BLESS THE AMERICAN HOMEOWNER!