SERVICER ABUSE: LOAN MODS BEING “DENIED” BECAUSE RECEIPT OF TRIAL PAYMENTS WERE DELAYED DUE TO HURRICANES

September 19, 2017

In what can only be described as outrageous, arrogant, and beyond belief, we have been receiving reports that servicers are issuing letters of denial as to loan mod applications where trial payments were received “late”, which delay was caused solely as a result of the recent hurricanes. This conduct demonstrates, without question, that servicers will use literally any excuse to deny a loan mod application and force a foreclosure, even when the delay is due to a force majeure (or act of God) and not as the result of any fault on the part of the homeowner.

What needs to happen is that these servicers need to be taught a very serious and nasty lesson through a multi-plaintiff claim against them which should include a claim for punitive damages. Using an event of mother nature, which a homeowner has no control over, to deny a loan mod application should also be declared to be illegal and a crime, with serious penalties including a mandatory $1Million fine for each occurrence to be paid to the homeowner directly by the servicer within 10 days of a finding of misconduct. Anything less will be laughed off by the servicers as a “cost of doing business” (which business is taking homes away).

We welcome the assistance of anyone in or affiliated with Congress or any state legislature to prepare a Bill to this effect.

Jeff Barnes, Esq., www.ForeclosureDefenseNationwide.com