How many late payments does it take to get a modification?

[mitkoff]

We live in California and Home Loan Services (HLS) [First Franklin (FF)] has so far refused to work with us. We received a modification over a year ago but have since had numerous devestating financial setbacks. Our loans are not Fannie Mae nor Freddie Mac so we don't qualify for POTUS's new program.

Basically, since we are only 1-month behind on the 1st mort. and 2-months behind on the 2nd, they won't work with us. We posted a similar thread HERE but so far no responses.

My questions are, how scary is it to stop paying the 2nd mort.? How far will the 2nd take the foreclosure? My wife and I are scarred to death that we will lose our home, which we love and plan (hopefully) to live there for at least 20 years. We are upsidedown by at least 20% (bought @ $535K now worth $425K).How do I verify our 2nd is a non-recourse loan?

We don't want to lose our home, but we also can't keep up these payments either.

HELP!!! Any advice anyone can offer will be greatly appreciated!

[dwynn]

I have Indymac, not sure how different all the companies are. I stopped paying my 1st and 2nd in Feb 09. I was told they couldn't work with me until I was 30 days late. I called on the 31st day and was told no, it is 45 days. I called on the 45th day and had a mod offer on April 3rd. So March 17th was my 45 days and they got the offer to me relatively fast. Today is April 29th and my mod is completed.

Good luck. And of course it is scary. The whole thing is. You want your home so hound them and stick with it. I didn't hire a lawyer or mod group, if I could afford that I could afford my mortgage! Fight fight fight.

[mitkoff]

dwynn, did you get a good mod?

Not sure why, but HLS keeps telling me that since my lender is private, their guidlines are very minimal in what they can do. Sure wish it was a Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. So now we're left with only two options, pay and bleed, or stop and be emotional wrecks. Not sure which is best, yet. Thanks for the encouragement dwynn!

[dwynn]

I don't know why HLS it telling you their guidelines are minimal. They set their guidelines. The presidents plan works for any lender should they choose to do it, and the government is giving incentives to do so. If HLS wanted to they could. I don't understand why they would rather deal with a foreclosure than shave some interest %. It baffles me, and I did have to deal with that with Indymac too. They said they would suggest a short sale and I said how does that help me? It doesn't . I loose my home, have crap credit and then have to rent etc...At least with a foreclosure I have free rent and some savings by the time the whole thing is done. Crazy but that was my logic. You don't want to work with me fine...I won't work with you, but I would swing back and forth and be a complete mess just like you said. So I kept hounding them.

They modified my first but not my second. Its a great mod, 3% for the first 5 years, 4% for the 6th and 4.75 fixed from the 7th on. The stretched it out to be a 40 year loan but payable in 30, meaning I have a huge balloon payment on the last month of the 30th year. I am not too worried about that figuring I will either sell it way before then or deal with it at the time. It keeps me in my house now at about the same amount I would be renting for.

The thing is if you pay and bleed you will be an emotional wreck anyways. The very worst thing that could happen to you is you rent. Yes it sucks but at least you have your wife, you would know that you tried your hardest and when go home at the end of the day you are able to relax without wondering if you will be coming home to your house 5 months from now. So horrible I know. I have a 2 year old and the last thing I wanted to do was have him feel my stress about the whole thing.

If you do a search of the threads about 2nd mortgages there is a post from a lawyer about foreclosing with a second. I can't remember everything but it talks about how it makes no sense for the company to forclose on a second especially when you are underwater. They only get paid after the first gets paid. Does that make sense? Someone also suggested bankruptcy to get rid of the second. Not sure how that works but seems really extreme.

Keep me posted!

[madresmustang]

I approached my mortgage comp. back in Mar. I was currently 1 payment behind, but due to drop in business was going to fall short in Mar. creating 2 behind. Wanted to setup a repayment plan.

Long story short I was put into modification process without my knowledge. Mortgage comp. told me they wouldn't except payments at this time during the process. I was still lost and getting no answers and one evening while seeing my last client out the door, a car drives up and posts a foreclosure notice on my house. Thankfully from a member, I was given this site. I got the exec # from this site and found out that I was forced into foreclosure so they can review my file to see if it fits the Presidents program.

So from what I have been learning to qualify for a mod it is the governments program, not one directly that your mortgage lender is doing. They are primarily doing the refi's or so they say. I was told you don't get seriously looked at until you have a foreclosure sale date, then the negotiator will put a hold on the sell while they do a review.

Now I am in a real battle with them for doing this. Financial docs haven't requested, no hardship letter nothing. I wouldn't have tried a mod. if it put me in foreclosure my house is where my income comes from to, so losing it means closing my business down and displacing children and their parents who rely on me. I now currently have 2k in lawyers fees for the trustee company that is handling the foreclosure for Well's Fargo on top of the amount behind I became from this program.

I would try the www.naca.com/refinance/refinanceSubmission.jsp I found it on this site. It sounds like it might be of help to you.