Failure is not an option for us....

[rozuki]

Cassietw,

Glad to hear your good news about the biopsy! I have had some personal issues that didn't involve CW/BofA (imagine that!!) that I have been dealing with, so haven't been able to pop in here.


I can't believe what you, Dthom, HereinNY, etal have been going through with all this new paperwork.....and you were submitted so many months ago and are still waiting!!! Is it because they are FannieM or FreddieM loans????? So sorry to hear NACA is not like it was...perhaps it's because of all the new hires...maybe they can't handle the stress? LOL

Anyhoo, I posted on the April restructure thread my travails in just trying to get CW/BofA cash my freaking check for my new loan mod payment!!! Still have to call the rest of this week to make sure they do.....

The fun just never stops!

PS. I was 4 months behind when I finally got the loan mod.....had 22k added to the principal...so you can imagine what my mtg payment was!

[Cassietw]

Hi dthom and Rozuki,

Thanks for posting... Nope not Fannie or Freddie..... you would think they would cash the check and look at where it came from later!!

I know what you mean about trying to come up with a payment dthom...

My son is out of work still. He has been applying everywhere! My daughter has missed a lot of work. She only makes about $1700 take home a month, and her share of cost monthly with Medi-cal is $1132.00 per month. She has car insurance, food, cell phone bill....gas to get to work and regular maintenance on her car. With all the recent tests and appointments, 26 miles drive to UCLA and parking ($10.00) everytime you enter the parking structure...she has missed a lot of work and has no money. Neither my son nor daughter have been able to help and I have helped them to get by.

My husband works for a used car dealership. Sales have been real slow... But, the biggest problem is that the dealership is owned by his sister and her husband. My husband just got $600.00 of his back pay and is still owed $2200.00 NET. (he gets paid twice a month and this is 6 weeks of pay-3 pay periods) If we take them to the labor board...it would cause family ripples and most likely will cost him the job. No-one is hiring right now. There are ads everywhere and they say we will keep your resume on file if more work is contracted etc... So we hope that things will turn around soon and cars will start selling again. We are also afraid that if he loses the job and can't get another one, we won't have income to show for the mod. Even though the paychecks are behind, we can still show the gross/net stubs for each week from the accountant for updated financials. Catch 22!!

Talking about unexpected, unwelcome, not needed, expenses....

Our 40+ foot tall 30+year old pine tree in the back yard was infected by bark beetles (Pine Beetles). The tree is dead and is a hazard to fall on the house. (We get the Santa Ana high winds here)...The tree service wanted $1200.00 to take it down.... We don't have that kind of money...so we bought a pruner and a chainsaw and rope. ($175.00 we could not afford to spend) We have friends come each weekend and we are taking it down little by little (no widow makers!!!) They all work together to make sure that the branches don't fall on the house, back windows don't get broken or their heads! One did swing around and hit my oldest son in the face. Broke his rx glasses, had to get those fixed.

Dog- The free dog that has cost me more money than I want to discuss! He bolted out the driveway door and we all ran around trying to catch him which took forever....we put him in the backyard after we caught him because we were angry. We locked the dog door. He isn't used to being locked out and ended up rubbing the top layer of pads off his two front feet trying to get in. So $65.00 later and bandages and doggy booties, he can walk again. AARRGGHHH!

[Cassietw]

To add insult to injury.... Our refrigerator started freezing everything in the fresh food section. I just called to see where I could get a new thermostat.... Per the Frigidaire repair center, I have to buy the kit....I was thinking maybe $10-$20 bucks for a thermostat......try $248.00 bucks! Most of my food is frozen and bad....and now this!!!!

Engine light is still on in the truck too...haven't taken it in to find out why yet...I am scared!

Just a little less to scrape together for the payment.....when it rains, it pours!!!

[HereinNY]

Cassie...I know how you feel. A couple of years ago..2 weeks before xmas our refrigerator had to be replaced..my stove broke, our septic got clogged and our power vent on our oil burner died...and we had a mouse that we couldnt seem to catch...

[Cassietw]

HEHE! Thanks HereinNY! I needed to hear that!!!! Okay, you got me beat there!!! LOL 2 years ago our water heater burst the day after Christmas....at least it was after and not on! Last year our central heat thermocouple or something like that burned out 6 days until Christmas....the repair guy basically put a bandaid on it for $200.00 bucks and said you need a new heater...well, guess what , I don't have $7000.00 for a new Central Heat system! Hope it makes it through this year!

I called another Frigidaire service location and got another person who said I can just get the COLD sensor and see if that worked before buying the whole kit. The part is refundable minus shipping if it turns out I do need the whole kit. I bought the lifetime warranty with it....the way things are going I got the feeling it could burn out in a month if I didn't!

Less damage to the pocket book. Only $86.18 after parts, tax, warranty and shipping! Whew... a little less traumatic! And...it will be here tomorrow!

[dthom]

Cassie and Herein

I know what you are both talking about. Last month we didn't make a payment because the car that we own and my oldest son drives had to have a new alternator, Nissan Maxima, $532 to have installed, couldn't get to the thing ourselves. License tabs for 4 cars, $228, my car needs brakes, and the EGR valve was making the car stall out, so my husband and son disconnected it some way, It runs great now, we are just ruining the atmoshere. LOL
We have our youngest son, daugter in law and 7 kids living with us now, so there are 12 of us in a 4 bedroom house. They were renting but the house was going into foreclosure, 2nd time this has happened to them in a year. They get food stamps, and help to pay utilities, and now that they don't have to pay rent, they are paying me every month for the car payment and insurance on the van that is in my name that they drive, ( son couldn't get a loan for a car at the time). That helps. Of course we still have to buy some groceries since the stamps weren't meant to feed so many of us. Thank goodness they are still allowed to have them while living with us. Son just went back to work when Chrysler went back, his company is a Chrysler only transportation contractor. He will be working 2 weeks on and 2 weeks off until first of next year it looks like. With 8 kids in the house from 2 to 14 it can be a little hectic at times.
If anything major breaks here we are in trouble. We couldn't afford to buy new appliances etc.
Everything I purchase I check to make sure it is a good value. I have learned to love generic paper products like TP, kleenex and paper towel and store brand everything. The dollar store is my friend. LOL

The joke here is that the one thing we can't skimp on is my husbands Peanut Butter. He likes a certain name brand, and absolutely refuses to have anything else! A real Peanut butter gourmet.LOL 14 year old only wants one name brand mac and cheese!
Funny how little things like that can become so important when you are pinching pennies. A local store had Ramen noodles for .49 for a six pack this week. I was really excited about that. Cheap lunches!!
We have to laugh at the insanity of it all. Being in our 50's and having to start all over again with everything. We didn't have to count pennies this much when we were first married 37 years ago and only one of us working.

When it rains it pours is right, I just wish it would stop pouring for while!

[CW California]

dthom
I can remember returning soda bottles in the 70's to get food when I first moved to California...........

[dthom]

Ahh the 70's...... Hey, we still return soda bottles to get food. When we run short of money we check on how many bottles we have. I have gotten good at it. A 30 gallon garbage bag full can equal at least $10.00!

[Cassietw]

I too collect bottles and cans for recycling! It has helped when we needed gas to get to work!

Yesterday Appt with NACA = Complete FLOP!

They called me 1 1/2 hours late on the wrong number. (Good thing I stayed home yesterday) The guy said he didn't know why I set up an appointment. I explained that I was told to send additional information and that it was necessary to schedule a counceling appointment after I faxed the new information to them. He then said he was transferring the call to someone he is currently training. I was again asked why I scheduled the appontment. Then I was put on HOLD for 5 minutes and the original person came back on and said that they had strict policies and needed to go to lunch and he would call me back at 2:30 pm his time.....

No-one called... I just got off the phone with NACA again and I have another appointment for tomorrow set at 1 pm Pacific time... I also had them change all our numbers on file to my cell since they can never seem to get that right. They have received no other data or requests from CW/BofA since May 29th... The NACA rep said that Countrywide was the slowest as they received up to 25,000 new loan mod requests a month.....


Good luck everyone...I am trying to stay positive, but it is difficult!

Letter of INTENT was certified and gave us until July 30th to remedy by paying $7330.00....I can't believe it got this far!

Refrigerator part was WRONG! Had to pay for service call and they won't have the parts for 3-5 business days. Most of our food is ruined. Gonna just go to the store everynight and buy what we need to make dinner....

[Cassietw]

Talked to David L. again just now since I got the letter of intent. He is truly a caring person!!!

He will be out all next week. Nothing new to update. Again, they are still waiting on the Obama guidelines for the principal forbearance.

I think everyone should send a fax/letter/email to Obama saying please give Countrywide/BofA the principal forbearance guidelines so they will take our Mod off HOLD and finish it!

He said anyone being considered for principal forbearance is on a list and as soon as the guidelines are received, the docs will be drawn up and proposal sent to NACA.

[Cassietw]

NACA Update:

I HIGHLY recommend to anyone going through NACA and who is about to go over all the paperwork to verify the information they uploaded to their system. I just had to send in updated financials and the 450-T form and Hardship Affidavit. Well while regoing over financials the guy says, so you have $87,000.00 in Credit card debt! I was like WTF???? The first person that submitted to CW listed our second mortage as a credit card!!!

Now that could mess things up!

Now the NACA person is going to fix that and try and escalate things and told me to send in the copy of the letter of Intent to Accelerate and the next 2 sets of paystubs and continue to do so every 2 new paystabs we get. (Husband and I are only paid twice a month). He said that way if BofA comes back asking for updated financials, they will have them and it will help speed up the process.

I am going to try to make a full payment before the 15th as the dealership had 2 good sales weeks in a row now and my husband is finally getting some of his back pay caught up....

Cut down the rest of our dead tree today....what a mess! This is going be a long weekend!

Still waiting on the refrigerator parts.... at least the freezer works! We have ICE and it is HOT!

Good Luck everyone and have a great rest of the weekend!!

[dthom]

Cassie

Same kind of thing happened to us. When I call CW/Bofa to make a partial payment last week I was transferred to Advocacy. They accepted the payment, but Dory wanted to make sure they had all of the correct info on us for the modification with NACA. Guess what, first she said well is your hardship over now, as we see it was due to your husbands illness. I told her that that came After the real hardship, the permanent loss of his job, and his being on unemployment. Then she said I see you only have $1500 per month income. I said no, that was my income, that husband does get unemployment,and had been since Jan. 15. No one they were having difficulty getting a negotiator assigned to our case if they only thought we had $1500 per month coming into the house! Then on top of that, they were waiting to see if our hardship due to illness had resolved!
I am worried too that the NACA submission got all mixed up. I did let advocacy know that we had sent NACA the 4506T as well as updated paystubs, home insurance info, and property tax info,even though both of those are escrowed, as well as new hardship statement. I actually sent in more than NACA asked for, as I included my 2008 tax return, and husbands per diem statement. Now if I can only get them to acknowledge they received it all. My next call date is Wed. I sure hope to hear some good news, but I will have questions as to why it was never reported to CW that husband lost his job, and why not all of our income was reported to CW. I mean come on, I have a $140000 mortage and they were asking for a mod based on my $1500 take home pay. No wonder we haven't gotten any where.

Had a great weekend. Yesterday, both of my boys and their families were here for BBQ. Lots of gr. Kids playing in the pool. Nice day for a change

[Cassietw]

Hi dthom,

It is unbelievable how these things get so messed up. I wish they had a "self-service loan mod" option. You know like in the grocery store where you can check yourself out. It is much faster..... They should have it all set up in a computer system....you plug in your information, the computer spits out the docs, you sign....

Oh wait, that was a good dream.....too bad we are living the nightmare!

[dthom]

You know they should hire all of us here to do the mods. Bet we all know just as much as they do at this point. Maybe even more. LOL

I do have to say, as discouraging as this all is, it has been quite the learning experience.

Call NACA tomorrow to see if they have been able to "find" a negotiator for our modification and if our status has changed ( probably not), but calling every one to two weeks has become a habit that will be hard to break if we ever do get approved.LOL>

[Cassietw]

I know what you mean about the habitual calling! And don't forget the habitual checking the BofA on-line account, the NACA website and this forum!! I will have to find a new hobby after this or I might have too much time on my hands! LOL!!

I KNOW that most of us here know more than they do!! I had to explain what a BPO was to the NACA rep I spoke to last month. THEN I had to explain to another NACA rep last week what a principal forbearance was. He kept saying, "no, you don't want a forbearance....that is just a break in making payments that you have to catch up" .... I had to break it down to him! then he was like..."OHHHHH that sounds good!" LOL

And, if you get anyone outside of the Advocacy department at CW/BofA, they are reading off a script and most likely have no clue what-so-ever!

trust me, if I knew what I know now when I purchased my home, I might not had signed. I really didn't understand a lot. No-one honestly explained things to me. I was told one thing and lead to believe that we were lucky to get the loan that we did.... Hindsight is 20/20!!

[Cassietw]

Nothing new to update....on-line account says to call after 07/09/2009 if there is no update. I called the advocacy department yesterday and of course no-one could talk to me due to going through NACA. But, they did accept a partial payment. I really could have used the money to catch up in other areas but I wanted to make some sort of payment to let them know that I still truly want my home. I sent just shy of the NACA proposed amount. (it was all I had)

I have seen a few more approvals this week. Congrats everyone!!

And everyone else hang in there!

Cassie

[HereinNY]

Cassie- Dont struggle to make your payments. I gave them two payments while waiting for the modification and they are still holding them in suspense. I dont know whether they will apply them to the principal balance I owe(which only lowers the payment by $20) or apply the money to my first and second payment of my modification..that would be great but probably not going to happen...Got my mod approved yesterday..Thank God.

[Cassietw]

Congrats HereinNY! I hope the terms are what your family needs!

For us, the more time that passes with nothing when so many get approved in a reasonable time frame lowers my expectations I guess. I would like to go home, check the e-mail and have an approval waiting there, but It feels less and less likely as time passes... it is hard to stay optimistic.

I had several friends tell me not to pay and several tell me I should to show that I truly want my home... I was at the 7/15/09 promised them I would pay something date and figured I would keep my agreement. I think I will try to pay the amount that NACA proposed every month.... Just feeles better paying something rather than nothing.

It shows up on the BofA site as a partial payment and has already come out of our account. We also bank with BofA so they didn't waste any time there!

[sandbchristy]

I too sent payments and they don't count them as being paid put them in a partial payment fund... mysteriously $1500 has disappeared out of the partial funds received total. No one can tell me where it went...but I've been assured "it's there, even if it doesn't show on your statement." RIGHT....cause... I'm an idiot?

One thing I've learned when dealing with Customer Service at CW/BofA... never ask a leading question. If I ask the rep if it went toward our escrow..."yes, that's exactly where it went."

So even if you make a partial payment....they still report you late.

[Cassietw]

I'm over the worry about our credit rating. That was already going down hill by not paying the credit cards to make the mortgage... Oh well.... We can rebuild it at a later date. This whole scenario has changed my way of thinking. I would rather buy something in cash going forward....If I don't have the cash...I don't really need it!

[HereinNY]

Cassie...I am in the same mess as you ....as far as the credit cards..I have MANY. I called each one of them and asked for a hardship program..simply told them I cannot afford the payments...each one of them gave me a reduction in interest rate, some 0%, the highest 6% plus they lowered the payment to ones that I can afford..(except Bank of America who would not lower the payment, no surprise there). Between saving $200 a month on credit card payments and $250 on my mortgage with my modification I am in much better shape than before...of course still have to watch my budget but maybe I can actually afford heating fuel. Talk to your creditors..

[sandyg]

---

Update:
BOA received my signed paperwork to accept the 3 month forbearance with zero payments due. i asked about the 8/1 sale date. They said that it was canceled. And I confirmed that info. with recontrust!!!!!!!!!!!!!!Yeah, no more notes on my door about the sale!

Kevin at NACA said to increase our income by $1000 a month and they would resubmit my origional mod. at the end of Aug. or Sept. If that goes down I will be happy. But, the single Mom of 3 boys that we have on staff will not be happy that she will be reduced by $1000 a month and going to part-time or she will have to quit or find another part-time job!

But, we have got to save our home for now and get this behind us. At our age we would not be able to qualify for another home in the future. Plus, being an owner of a business we cannot file BK personally without filing on the business. And they would sell our business assets for the bk and we would end up without anything like computers office furniture and inventory to run our business with. Plus my husband has state securities licenses and he would have to tell them about the bk and no one would bond him anymore. So we would be without his licenses to run the business.

What a mess!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Congrats to everyone who got their mod's! Have a great

[Cassietw]

Update:

Spoke with David Leighton today at BofA. We are still on HOLD for principal forebearance. He said to call back again in 2 or 3 weeks.

I received a letter from BofA saying to contact them as they may have a workout available for us. (what a joke!)

Been on Jury duty for the last 10 days and going to work in the evenings so I haven't had a chance to keep up with everyone's stories.

ALERT: David Leighton is leaving on Thursday for the NACA event in St. Louis. He will be gone for a bout a week.

Take care everyone! I hope there have been more approvals.

Good Luck!

Cassie

[dthom]

Good to hear from you Cassie.

I called David for first time yesterday. Found out that somehow our file had been closed. He reopened for me. Already today BofA website shows Active Processing and the message about being under review. We have another phone appt with NACA on Thursday to update our info, and make sure it is still the same. David did say that is not unusual. Now I hope that BofA can pull all of our info from NACA and get this thing rolling. Have no idea why NACA didn't realize our file had been closed, but at least it has been corrected.
I am so glad I finally took the dive and decided to call him. Now I could kick myself for not doing so sooner.

Hope things workout for you soon1

[Cassietw]

Hi dthom,

It doesn't really shock me that they closed it. That is why I call at least every two weeks or so for updates. You should call David again in two weeks. He is a great person. I truly believe he cares about people.

Sorry it was closed....you have been waiting 2 months longer than I have but we both stopped paying our full mortage at the same time. I think I am further behind than you though....

We just passed our 4 months since submission to BofA and nothing. I am waiting to see the report that is supposed to coming out about the lenders in early August showing the statistics and complaints. I sent a communication to the White House / Obama also but I am sure it is lost in the mix with the 10,000 or more communications sent to them daily.

Oh Well....can't give up yet though.....

Take care,

Cassie