The foreclosure crisis just resulted in a very expensive mix-up for one Mississippi resident.
Terry Jordan was sold the wrong foreclosed home by her realtor and wasn't informed until after she had spent thousands of dollars on renovations, WREG 3 reports. Her realtor then admitted she had actually been sold the house a few feet away, one half the size and full of mold.
Mississippi is far from one of the more dense foreclosure landscapes in the country. Only one in 4034 properties received a foreclosure filing in March, according to RealtyTrac. Yet the realty company told WREG 3 that they had been given the wrong information by the bank in charge of the foreclosed home anyway. Jordan planned to sell the home at a profit.
Banks are still showing signs of disorganization on all things foreclosure. Take, for example, that fact that two JPMorgan Chase employees that work directly with homeowners said they were not aware of the recent mortgage settlement and its requirement for the banks involved -- including JPMorgan Chase -- to pursue principal reduction, as a housing advocate told The Huffington Post in late March.
The foreclosure process has been criticized as an impersonal experience, with little room for negotiating with banks. Some claim that banks often are too disorganized to even acknowledge receiving paperwork, let alone modify the mortgage of an underwater borrower.
That lack of face-to-face contact hit a tipping point during the robo-signing crisis, when it was discovered that major U.S. banks, including both Bank of America and Wells Fargo, had been signing off on foreclosure documents without properly reviewing the details of the case. Such robo-signing actions were likely taken to process the enormous number of homes stuck in some stage of the foreclosure process. It takes time. In Brooklyn, New York, to use a striking example, the average foreclosure process now lasts an average of 1,187 days.
Speeding up the process can cause problems, however. In another example of foreclosure confusion, a Houston couple and their 18-month-old daughter faced eviction in October because they never were technically transferred the deed of their house, according to MyFoxHouston.
A family in Utah also faced foreclosure after already selling their home -- potentially ruining their credit score, according to Connect2Utah.com and KUTV 2 News.