Has anyone one had any sucess with trying to do an in house modification and being current? We are trying not to get behind on any of our payments as we have worked so hard on our credit scores but we need to modify and can't hold our much longer. Just wondering what our hopes are.
I have seen many go through in the last 3 plus years. However, the percentage that successful vs the amount who attempted them was very small. If I was to give you an honest guesstimate, I'd safely say 5-7% percent. So, 95-97 who tried, failed.
The odds are certainly not like the lottery, but it is still very tough. I think the more savvy, persistent and people person you are, the better your odds.
Best Regards,
Maurice Bedard
Founder of LoanSafe.org
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I can be persistent and savvy. Hopefully it is enough.
If you are current, you must be nearly broke with no liquid assets over 3 times your monthly mtg payment amount. You aren't required to report retirement funds for HAMP, but the banks ask for them and seem to be counting them as liquid assets. Until you are over 60 days late, the assets count against you.
If you really have no savings, and your income won't suport your bills, you should go ahead and apply. I was current when I applied, and was approved for a trial almost immediately. They have completely screwed up everything since, but it has nothing to do with being current or not.
You probably know that they will base your payment on 31% of your GROSS income, not take home or net. Make a log of documents you provide and who you talk too. They claim to lose a lot of paperwork.
if your with BofA and you enter HAMP, you will soon be behind, BofA counts the difference between modification and actual payments as late payments, when i asked the negotiator about it, he had a good point, the loan owners arent going to to approve someone thats making the payment on time, so by the time 6 or 7 months go by, your a few months late..
personal experience on my part.. then again, the gain from a modification is worth the ding to the credit score.
We bought our home in August 2006 and never had a late payment. We are in AZ, so our situation may be different from most. We purchased for 229K with an appraisal of 270K so we thought we were getting a great deal and planned to refi after 3 yrs (we totally knew what we were getting into with respect to our final loan terms even thought they were TOTALLY different from what was originally quoted/promised by the lender, but had no clue where the market was heading). We qualified for and received a mod with AHMSI with no headache whatsoever. We just completed the first year of our mod. Our initial terms were at a 2.0% rate and it will "mature" to 5.5% after 4 yrs and will then be fixed at that time. My husband is military and we had a LOT of hardship in our situation, but we were successful without ever having a late payment in our entire history. We are now looking to try for a 2nd modification in an attempt to get a principal reduction (which was pretty much never being done when we got our mod). As a result of our loan/financial situation, our family has been living apart for almost 3 years now (my husband got stationed elsewhere and because of the market, we couldn't sell and weren't initially allowed to rent as per loan terms).
We were also initially part of Ameriquest (Argent) so have some resources through them as a result of a recent settlement and we're hoping we can get this mod to go through with their assistance.
I honestly thought it was going to be much more difficult than it was. The people we dealt with were awesome and in constant communication with us. The entire process from start to finish took about 3 weeks (from the time we got all of the needed docs to them, after a bit of runaround because our loan had been transferred in the middle of a mod attempt with previous lender). We had two months of no payments and the new terms were wonderful (no additional crazy costs tacked on, no ridiculous fees I've heard others talk about, straightforward terms).
Good luck to you! Put as much info as you can in your hardship letter to truly explain your situation. That may be what put us over the top in the end.
From my experience with wachovia being current is definitely going to slow things down... I was denied 3 times from the loss mitigation reps after phone interview and the reasons were "you are current" "you show no hardship".Originally Posted by tinkerbell77
I stayed current and through this wonderful website I found the OOP contacts and sent my compelling hardship letter to them and viola 3 1/2 months later I'm approved for a Loan Mod with a principle reduction.
So it depends on who your negotiator / underwriter is makes a world of difference......good luck
Hello Wizzy,
I'm in a similar situation with Wachovia--current and looking for a principal reduction. Could you PLEASE kindly pass along your OOP contact information? That would be awesome. Thanks in advance and congratulations!
Ok so I think we got it. I almost don't want to talk about it yet for fear that I will jinx it but I think we got the in house mod and are still current.
I talked to my negoiatior last night for the first time since this started, she went over my financial information on the phone with me and she also told me that she had pulled my credit. After looking at everything she said that she can lower my rate from 9% to 4.75% but the only thing is that now I will be required to escrow so the payment will only go down about $100. Really that is great I will take it. I mean I have to pay taxes and insurance every month anyway. So she said that it still has to be approved by the investor (I know my loan is not with Fannie or Freddie is there another one?) but we should be getting paperwork in 4 to 6 weeks. Just wondering can I feel like this is going to be approved or is there a long history of the "investor" saying no???? Please help I am ready to sleep at night.
Thanks,
Tink
I got my HAMP mod about a year ago while current, and it only took about a month and a half...went way smoother than I expected. It did establish escrow also, and it prevented my rate from skyrocketing this year, but it also made my payment about $100 MORE. At the time it was okay because my now ex husband, though unemployed, was getting unemployment so I had more income in the house (but didn't have to declare to AHMSI becuase I was the only one on the loan). I have since gone through a crazy divorce and the ex lives one street away and has stalked me, even WITH a restraining order! I'm scrimping to make it month to month, and I have a decent job...I just decided that I'm going to walk...it's too much house (5 bed/3 bath), and too much $$ for just me and my 2 kids...I'm paying the child care costs completely myself and that's what's killing me. But if you're current, and have the income for at least the 31%, the process will probably go smooth...just beware that it might not help as much as you hope it would! Good luck!
Under the HAMP program, the government actually pays servicers more to modify loans that are current, so they have every incentive to work with you. The major eligibility criteria is 1) mortgage debt ratio must be above 31% of your GROSS income and 2) there must be "imminent default," meaning they must be able to determine that your monthly expenses aren't supported by your NET income. If you've managed to stay current, but it's apparent that you're just barely making it, they should be willing to work with you. If you are not approved for the HAMP program, don't fret. They will still consider your loan for an in-house modification, which is usually just as good or better, you just lose out on a couple of government subsidized perks. Follow up regularly. Give your negotiator time to return your call (they are super busy), but be the squeaky wheel. Best of luck.
Dorian, we've been current during our mod process, but this month, we may fall behind. Do you feel this may hurt us or help us? I've wondered if being current was giving us an "edge"? I'm not sure how much the incentives encourage the servicers to try work with the current homeowners, or do they really care?
We, too, are current but next month our mortgage payment goes to 6088 from 3815 which went up from 2189 in October a few weeks after being denied a loan mod because they based it on the negative amor amount at the time. We owe 779k on our mortgage...Yikes! I want to try and stay current our biggest problem is we have liquid assets we use to flip homes, currently trying to finish one. We just started doing them again after a 5 year halt due to too many people jumping on the bandwagon. So the problem is we have 2 children with saving accounts(40k each) for their college funds. If most of our liquid assets are in their accounts will this count against us as our liquid assets? I'm not willing to give the mortgage company my childrens future when we have been diligently trying to work with them. Our mod papers are ready to be sent in but need to know the best solution for the liquid assets. Please advise.
After reading all of your posts and after dealing with AHMSI for the past three years and dealing personally with all of the hell they have put me through I can honestly advise all of you that doing business with this company is not in your best interest for they are not to be trusted as they are nothing but FRAUD and incompetance all the way to Wilbur Ross's pocket books. If any of you read my posts you will see the modification scams that they tried to put me through . . good luck and God bless whatever your decisions may be. Just a word on my part to the wise.
Absolutely correct. I feel bad for all the people that lost their homes. I am still fighting but how much longer.
Hello Irishmom,
I'm currently negotiating the "promissory note". We started at 40k and I told them no. They came back with 10k promissory, I told them no. What happened with your promissory note? or did you go into foreclosure?
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