Wachovia/Webster Bank - Loan Mod possible, I hope?

[HorribleWarning]

Hi all,

I posted on another forum all about my mortgage woes and a guy in FL responded to me, saying that he does loan mods. Great!

Just in case his services don't work out, however, here's the scoop on our situation.

We (husband and I) bought our house in 2004, for $535K with something like $110K down. We had sold our condo for a profit of $70K and we already had $40K equity in it aside from that, thanks to my dad, who had "gifted" us the down payment on our condo. So our original loan - which at that time was with Wells Fargo - was written for about $425K.

We currently make $112K or so. He's a teacher and I also work in the public sector - typically, our income goes up by about 4% per year. At the time we bought the house our income wasn't as high (and our credit scores weren't as good) so our broker talked us into what he referred to as a "pick-a-payment" mortgage. I had misgivings about it, as I was already starting to wonder how much longer home values could go up, but my husband dragged me into the broker's office to "talk some sense" into me. I can still remember the guy saying "Look, I own two houses with this kind of mortgage! This is how teachers build wealth!" The minimum payment was $1400, which worked well with our budget.

We figured we'd keep the loan for a year, MAX, then refi.

A few months later, my dad, who alone makes more than twice what we do and has no debt, demanded his $40K back. My husband also decided at that time to take out a little extra to help with living expenses over the summer.

You can probably see where this is going.

We now are in a situation where, according to an appraisal just done, the house is worth $520K, but we owe $470K on the first and now about $94K on the second. Our minimum monthly payment on the house is $2600, which includes property taxes impounded to the tune of $700/month and a 6.9% rate, which my husband bought down from whatever it was going to reset to this time; I'll have to ask. On the second, we pay $700/month at 8% interest. Total mortgage: $3300/month. We have a couple hundred extra left over at the end of the month.

Thankfully, our son turns 5 next month, which reduces our childcare bill by at least $100. Also, I just rolled all my credit card debt into one payment at the credit union, reducing that monthly bill by almost $300.

The loan mod guy I talked to today thinks he may be able to propose a fixed 6% for up to 7 years. This would bring the total P&I for the first to $2800/month, so by my calculations, adding in the payment for the second and property taxes would total about $3800. But at least no negative amortizaton. In 5-7 years I'm hoping the market has stabilized some.

Anyway, that's my story...

[schwefls]

Welcome to our forum Horriblewarning:

I am sorry to hear of your hardship. Please know you are not alone, we are here for you. Shortly someone will be reaching out to you to get some more specifics regarding your mortgage/financials. In the meantime please surf our forum. You will see that you can modify on your own. I strongly suggest you be ware of 3rd parties trying to do this for you when you can do it for free....

There are alot of scammers out there trying to once again take advantage of us.

Please proceed with caution.

[Cat Damiano]

Horrible Warning,

Schwefls is right............you can do this yourself............

And if I can save you some money I will tell you...........that a person can propose a modification specific rate all he or she wants until they are blue in the face and all you will or won't get is only what the investor will offer............and nothing different........they all have their bottom lines and margins to go by and it is different in each and every case.

[HorribleWarning]

Schwefls and Cat,

Thanks for your responses. You say I can do this myself, but what about someone like, oh, I don't know... Marshall E. Rosenbach (to whom I put out feelers yesterday as well)?

DH and I both work full-time and it would be nice to have someone on our "team" to help us through this.

[Cat Damiano]

Well.............he is a good choice..........too........since you are in Cali.....

Or you can try 1-888-995-HOPE or NACA

[HorribleWarning]

OK, I tried NACA's site. It timed out on me, so I walked away to do something, and when I came back there was an automated e-mail giving me a client number. Tried to log in, using that number, entered my e-mail address and hit "Mail Me My Password" and got an error.

Then I tried starting over and when I hit "Save and Next Step" I got a blank screen. I give up.

[schwefls]

HorribleWarnng:

Hi, you need to be a bit more patient with HOPE NOW and NACA they are exremeley overwhelmed they are handling 3-5 times their normal caseload; their websites have 3-5 times more hits than normal. Marshall is great I did speak with him personally early on and I was confident he could get the job done however, my circumstances required me do this alone for free and bank everything towards that unexpected down payment.

Please keep this in mind, we know you are frustrated, anxious and overwhelmed. But you need to take a deep breath, realize that this is doable, be patient, assume nothing, and remember "good things come to those who wait".

My suggestion, contact Marshall, call HOPE NOW in the latter part of the evening, or get the process started yourself with the tools we have here. Either choice this process could and will take 45-60 days irregardless of who initiates it.