A recent article by the Huffington Post's Peter S. Goodman showed how one homeowner from the Bronx has continued to struggle to save her home because of the outrageous treatment she's received at the hands of the bank that services her loan. Reporting with painstaking detail the obstacles Bank of America has thrown up as Katie Diaz spent months trying to secure a mortgage modification that lowered her monthly costs, Goodman's piece highlights the reality too many homeowners have faced during this crisis -- the dropped calls, lost paperwork and poor customer service that leaves them frustrated, confused and unsure whether they will be able to save their home.
Unfortunately, the author assigned much of the blame for these failures not to Bank of America, Ms. Diaz's servicer -- but rather to the $25 billion mortgage servicing settlement that Bank of America and four other servicers agreed to this spring. The largest mortgage relief effort in history, the settlement provides $17 billion in consumer relief and billions more to states that can be used for proven anti-foreclosure efforts like housing counseling. It also creates tough new customer service standards that require servicers to put an end to the kind of behavior faced by Ms. Diaz.
However, from Goodman's piece, the reader is left to believe that the settlement has failed before it has even fully taken effect.
Not only does the piece fail to cite any of the homeowners who have already received significant relief through the settlement, it isn't until the fourteenth paragraph that the article even mentions that the new servicing standards designed to protect Ms. Diaz and others from the abuses documented in the article won't be fully implemented until early-October -- when the settlement requires the banks to fully comply with more than 300 specific servicing standards.
The story also fails to include several key facts about the settlement that will help homeowners like Ms. Diaz going forward:
First, the article makes no mention that the new standards will require servicers to send a representative to foreclosure proceedings with "appropriate access to information from Servicer's books and records necessary to perform their duties," and to further "ensure that foreclosure and bankruptcy counsel and foreclosure trustees have an appropriate Servicer contact to assist in legal proceedings and to facilitate loss mitigation questions on behalf of the borrower." Where Ms. Diaz and her housing counselor were stuck working with a bank representative who clearly was unfamiliar with her case, its status or history, under the settlement, after October 5th, servicers will have an obligation to make sure that this practice is ended once and for all.
Second, the article fails to note that the settlement forces servicers to provide a single point-of-contact for homeowners like Ms. Diaz and their representatives so they can speak with someone at the bank who will not only have knowledge of their account, loan status and requests but also make sure a homeowner receives all the information they need to make an informed decision about their modification options. Specifically, the settlement states that the "Servicer shall establish an easily accessible and reliable single point of contact for each potentially-[modification] eligible first lien mortgage borrower so that the borrower has access to an employee of Servicer to obtain information throughout the loss mitigation, loan modification, foreclosure processes." Just last month, all five servicers in the settlement reported to the independent monitor that they have implemented this important standard for their operations going forward.
If these specific terms from the settlement seem to have been written with Ms. Diaz' problems in mind, it is because they were. State Attorneys General and the U.S. Trustees involved in bankruptcy proceedings have seen this scenario occur far too often and they collaborated to craft language directly responsive to those issues.
Third, little is mentioned about Joe Smith, the independent settlement monitor who, once a servicing standard is implemented, has the authority to penalize banks that fail to uphold it. Under the settlement, Joe has resources that the banks are obligated to provide above and beyond the $25 billion that allow him to oversee their implementation of all of the servicing standards and consumer relief provisions in the settlement. If a bank fails to meet the settlement's requirements in a particular area, Joe can impose millions of dollars in fines and penalties. Finally, Joe, the Department of Justice or any one of the 49 state attorneys general can take them back to court for non-compliance if necessary. More information about the Monitor's extensive authority can be found at www.mortgageoversight.com.
Fourth, almost none of the other progress the Administration has made to help homeowners is included -- from the significantly shortened time it takes for families to receive a modification through the Home Affordable Modification Program (HAMP), to President Obama's fight to not only create the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) to protect ordinary families, but also recess appoint Richard Cordray as its director. Indeed, just this week the CFPB took a critical step toward setting uniform servicing standards for the entire mortgage market with a proposed rule which would provide additional clarity for families struggling to keep their homes and ensure that homeowners who are current on their mortgage aren't victimized by the kinds of processing errors that have harmed so many families. Specifically, the CFPB announced that mortgage servicers will now be required to help homeowners in default avoid foreclosure by connecting them with staff dedicated to help them avoid foreclosure.
Finally, while Goodman details the frustrating story of Ms. Diaz, when he declares the failure of the settlement he completely ignores the homeowners across the country who have already received real relief as a result of the settlement -- including those who have seen the balance they owe on their mortgage reduced by tens, and in many cases hundreds, of thousands of dollars.
Homeowners like Milagros Rodriguez of Miramar, Fla., who fell three months behind on her mortgage when her husband fell seriously ill. It was only because the settlement reduced the principal balance of her loan by $104,000 -- and monthly payments by more than $650 -- that she was able to keep their home while he recovered.
Homeowners like Sabrina Lacy -- a single mother, retired nurse and Army veteran from Long Island who fell behind on her mortgage payments after an injury she suffered while deployed left her unable to work. Because of the settlement, her servicer reduced the principal balance on her loan by more than $215,000 -- giving her peace of mind and financial security she needs to support her family and serve her community.
The banks aren't helping these families out of the goodness of their hearts. Rather, it's because the broad range of efforts across the Administration, including the settlement, have established clear requirements, incentives and penalties that have started changing their behavior. As housing counselors I've met are telling me, while there is still much work to be done, servicers are responding quicker and providing help faster.
Obviously, the settlement won't solve all of housing problems overnight, and I recognize the skepticism some may have about whether or not the banks will live up to their obligations. But for me, the story of Katie Diaz and the countless others like her does not suggest that the settlement is failing -- but rather the importance of holding the banks' feet to the fire in the months to come.
With tough new standards soon to be in place -- and an Independent Monitor with the authority to enforce them -- I'm confident we will.
Follow Shaun Donovan on Twitter: www.twitter.com/@HUDnews
Moreover, much of the "$25 billion" is illusory, e.g. 40% credit for cancelling 2d mortgages that are completely underwater and generally uncollectible and the @$8B that was from the previous Countrywide settlement.
From the former TARP Inspector General, Neil Barofsky, we learn that Geithner told the banks that HAMP was for their benefit, just to stretch out foreclosure. HARP was a joke for 3 years. Therehas been no enforcement by the Obama Administration. The only real help for borrowers has come from a small number of attorneys nationwide who have brought to the public's attention bank abuses such as robo-signing, forged documents, etc.
WHERE IS DONOVAN NOW TO DISPUTE WHAT I HAVE BEEN POSTING FOR THE LAST THREE DAYS. IT DOES NOT TAKE ANY COURAGE TO SIT IN WASHINGTON DC AND ACT AS IF WE LOVE THE TROOPS THEN SCREW US BEHIND CLOSE DOORS. IT YOU GOT A PAIR LET DEBATE WHO IT IS THAT YOU THINK GINNIE MAE OWNS HOME LOANS IT CANNOT AND DID NOT PURCHASE OR ORIGINATE!
Don't be afraid of a little old enlisted infantry soldier without the credentials of a Harvard Grad. Working for Wells Fargo for a short while made drug dealers and pimps look like priest. $100 drug deal or $100,000 home theft only makes sense in America that the $100 crime gets 10 year and the $100,000 crime get a mansion in the Hamptons!
Now as Ginnie Mae is only the "insurer" to the investors that are buying the securities, not buying home mortgage loans, as Ginnie Mae who is not involved in the transaction but only holding the Blank Notes. Now Ginnie does get the Lender to sign endorsing the Notes in Blank and sign HUD 11711A agreements that relinquish any and all right, title and financial interest in the loan to Ginnie Mae, however because Ginnie cannot buy or sell a home mortgage loan and the Blank Notes are worthless because they were not purchase.
In order to call a loan due one must be owed a debt and is why Ginnie is not in title at the local land recording offices because they are not owed a dime not only from the home loan borrowers but the Lender also who sold the mortgage backed securities to a third party and not Ginnie.
Regular fixed rate loans started to default and Washington Mutual was no longer alive as a bank and had no claims to the loans in the pools. Ginnie took an opportunity to feed off the Troops and have Wells Fargo impersonate as the Lender by having a robo signer submit fraudulent document to the courts.
What it will show because all those loan were placed into a pool and freely handed to Ginnie Mae on the day it was given its certification that the Note is currently and always every after Blank meaning Washington Mutual Bank had signed endorsing the Note to no one, and cannot be sold because Ginnie Mae is suppose to be in possession of and even if Wells Fargo Bank is in physical possession of the documents they like Ginnie Mae cannot produce a single bit of evident of purchasing the 1.3 million loans it was only servicing.
What is stupid is that because of the way Ginnie Mae is set up, they have no defense because their rules and the law prohibit the crook from having a financial interest in the loans. If you loan was not pooled then the owner whould be JPMorgan Chase who purchase (or assumed) $308 billion of Washington Mutual assets, which is currently under question as to their ownership of those loans.
Now in 2012 the Justice Dept has announced that it will make 70 arrest in the coming weeks. Since Nov 21, 2011 I have been writing HUD about this corruption and the OCC, DOJ & SIGTARP who's ex-chief now making the round of the look the other way strategy.
It not even a matter where Wells Fargo is still claiming that they owed the loan because they have retracted that claim and I have provided that letter to Donovan, however HUD is not letting fact get in the way. Yet instead of dealing with me HUD is willing to have articles written that question this great alleged program but it Ginnie Mae who is the biggest violator of wrongful foreclosure, which is easy to prove the involvement because of MERS electronic data base, clearly lead back to Ginnie and its regulator HUD!
Now I have written Donovan at least 50 times and have provided a confession letter from Wells Fargo Bank, who falsely recorded documentation to the court claiming to be owner of my mortgage when in fact they were not as they have admitted in their letter (dumb).
However instead of correcting the situation that really uncover a few trillion dollar fraud by Ginnie, Mae who's Regulator is HUD, the Secretary get on here and talk about a couple case where one is obviously corruption in the Nurse hurt while on active duty that the lender did or was going to foreclose on her.
However what Donovan does not tell the public is that it is Ginnie Mae who stop servicemembers and veteran from obtaining a modification because it is Ginnie Mae that holds the Blank Notes without having any financial interest in the loans but because they are not a Lender and are not the "holder in due course" they cannot authorize any action on the loans.
So you have 15,000 military that during 2009-2010 that were not allowed a modification because of Ginnie Mae. The fact is that servicemembers and veterans actual did not need a modification because their loan where free & clear.
Depending on the big banks to self-regulate foreclosures on Residential Mortgage Backed Securities (RMBS) pursuant to the settlement agreement or laws when they make a huge amount of pure profit on the foreclosures is laughable. The foreclosures are pure profit because the homes have been paid off several times over by something a lot like insurance. When the servicer forecloses, it keeps all the proceeds at the foreclosure sale. Until then the servicers are paid minimally.
Contrasted to the traditional bank-borrower relationship where the bank is dependent on the borrower to repay the loan, the RMBS structure makes the servicer perversely incentivized to foreclose leaving homeowners in a securitized trust 250% more likely to be foreclosed on than the traditional bank-borrower. This scheme is tax-exempt!
Despite rhetoric, appointing Richard Cordray and Mr. Schneidereman, the Obama administration, which I supported, has done nothing to quell foreclosures. President Obama put Eric Holder, a former partner at the law firm which crafted the MERS contract (which defined no interest for the homeowner) in charge of prosecuting the big bankers and former clients. Until a big bank corporate executive goes to jail, the banks will continue to violate the settlement and the laws. Paying the fines is a merely cost of doing business. Until the foreclosure crisis is over, the economy will suffer, all of us who work for a living will suffer. Foreclosure is the 800 lb gorilla in the room for the Obama administration.
Now the decision was made by Ginnie Mae and Wells Fargo to not process me for any modification (HAMP or VA HAMP) but instead on the $202,400 balance, they foreclose, and between the foreclosure sale, insurance placed on the loan made they made out with $435,095 according the the Wells Fargo Bank Account Activity Sheet. So what do you think was the motivating reason to foreclose?
Now neither Ginnie Mae or Wells Fargo can provide a single piece of evidence to purchasing my loans as well as the other 1.3 million loans Wells Fargo started servicing for Washington Mutual Bank in a servicing agreement done on Jul 31, 2006.
Even as it not possible for Washington Mutual to have arranged the servicing because they no longer own my mortgage after Aug 6, 2003 even before the first payment was due.
Once Washington Mutual was seized & declared a "fail bank", Ginnie Mae was along suppose to be in possession of the Blank Note, continued Wells Fargo collecting the payments. However by law Ginnie Mae cannot collect payment just as Al Capone, and neither can get their bankster friend to run a shell game and collect payments for non-lender and RICO company Ginnie Mae!
How does the man that negotiating settlement for False Claim yet his Ginnie Mae is at the center of as many as a million false claims simply not address these crimes of robo signing and fraudulent foreclosing?
I get it why Ginnie Mae allows the corruption and take part in it because it needs to make money to cover the commitment it has, however its breaking the law to pad the pocket of Ginnie Mae who has not invested a single red cent. Just as Fannie ex-CEO Mudd is charged with not telling investor of Fannie's subprime exposure.
However here we are on Aug 11, 2012 and we have not address an issue larger than those two put together and it involve our Troops. So if I sound anger its because I am, as this holier than thou attitude that the Federal Government is helping while there are 1 million unemployed veteran because in part the bank discriminated because of the color of people skin.
It s only a matter of time that the world come to know the truth behind these Ginnie Mae foreclosures and hopefully today is that day. Naive was hoping the Secretary of HUD did not know!
We the Troops v. HUD Secretary Donovan.
I will prove to the world with the evidence that I have already provided to HUD, OCC, Justice Dept & VA where we have an invalid Deed of Trust to begin with and later fraudulent Notice of Default, Assignment of Deed of Trust, Substitution of Trustee plus Blank Note. Why if is important is that it will show the pattern of the crime and I have the ability to recreate all the loan processing as it was my line of business.
2 .5 yrs of BS