Above the fold, top story of Saturday’s Delaware Gazette: “County courts to start foreclosure mediation program”.Wow. That’s a very cool concept, if it was really new.
“The ability to file for an extension is not new, but homeowners unfamiliar with their rights in a foreclosure case may not be aware that it is available, said Delaware County Clerk of Courts Jan Antonoplos,” wrote Gazette staff writer Devon Immelt.
It appears that the new component of the program is that for $100 home owners – living in the home – are able to secure an attorney acting as a mediator between the two parties.
The goal of course is that the home owner and the bank will negotiate acceptable terms for both sides which will accomplish a win-win:
- the bank will get its money
- the homeowner will remain in the home
According to common pleas judge W. Duncan Whitney, there were 1,099 foreclosures in Delaware County last year and there have been more than 90 during the first two months of 2008.
In theory, this is a good idea. In theory this will help many homeowners. In practice, I want to see the numbers in a month. Will anyone take them up on this offer?
I’m not skeptical, but the program is beginning far to late in the process to truly help. We need to be reaching out to people at the first signs of trouble — before they are 90 days past due with the mortgage and the bank has filed its foreclosure paper work.
What does this mean?
If the home-owner is in trouble they need to begin the process right away. Don’t ignore the problem or feel embarrassed. Step up to the plate and make that call to save your home.
Good luck!
Art by Toby Boyce (c) 2008. All Rights Reserved.Â
Hi, My name is Jill and my husband is Joe. We have a 2 year old daughter and help support 2 elderly parents that are semi retired and live in our 2nd home. I am the primary wage earner for our family and I recently lost my income of $150,000+ per year by corporate downsizing while working the past 6 years in the home finance division of JP Morgan Chase and 18 years in the same field. I attended Ohio State as a business major. My husband has also worked a very stable job for Mercedes Benz for 18 years and his income unfortunately cannot cover our bills. We are close to $1,400,000 in debt with mortgages and credit cards and we are not late on any bills but we will be soon. We are a few months away from losing everything and we do not know what to do. We have 2 homes in Powell that we owe more than what they are worth. Our primary home in Powell appraised by 2 separate appraisers 3 years ago for $830,000 and now the banks are saying it is tax assessed for $508,000 and we owe $780,000 on a 1st and 2nd mortgage. The other home my parents live in is in Powell in Big Bear Farms and we owe $319,000 and it is tax assessed at $238,000. We have contacted our mortgage holders and they do not seem motivated to work with us. We would like to have them adjust the mortgages down to what the homes are worth and make the payments affordable. Is there any way to help make this happen. We do not want to lose our homes and we want to pay what we are able to afford. Our circumstances are devastating to our entire family and I want to be able to work with the lenders and come to an agreement so we do not lose our homes.
Jill,
I would contact the Deleawre Cty court and try to get a mediator involved. I am a mediator myself and have been trained int he foreclosure mediation. Your situation is in a good place to begin talking to your crediters before you get into default. Also you can go to save the dream.org for help. There are also other advocates in the area that can help out. I think that with your situation and the pressure now being put on the creditors and servicers that you can get this done. Going through the court will also give you some leverage to get your creditors to the table. Just keep pressing them to work with you.
Wow…..our situation has been going on for 1 1/2 years and we have been thru the run around with CitiMortgage. We were approved for a modification under the supposed Housing affordability program in June , 2009. It took 1 year to get an approval from Citimortgage from the 1st call to the modification paperwork being sent to us from the bank, filled out and sent in and then we had to fill out a 2nd modification package and send that one in…..finally June, 2009 I thought we made a breakthrough and received an approval for a 3 month trial period for a lower payment. We made the 1st payment. I called a few weeks later to make the 2nd trial payment and the Citi rep informed me that the previous rep had made a mistake and that our modification approval was an error, because the investor for our mortgage loan does not allow any modifications. (We have a Jumbo loan of $600,000 and it is not a FNMA or FMAC loan), so Citi said to submit a 3rd set of modification paperwork under Citi’s modification program and of course a month later I called and they said again that our investor does not allow any modifications?????? It took them a year to supposedly modify the loan, another couple of months to figure out that the investor does not do modifications and then another 4 months and we have received notice that foreclosure proceedings are moving forward after 1 1/2 years of trying to work with the bank. We listed the home for sale in October, 2009 to try to do a short sale and have only received one ridiculously low offer from an investor basically trying to steal our home for $220,000. I just sent paperwork to Delaware County courts for a 90 day extension and a mediation appointment on December 22, 2009. We have tried to attack this problem head on from the start of my losing my job before any payments were late. We are now a year behind on our mortgage payments and feel like we have received no help. We are disgusted with the way Citimortgage has handled our situation and feel like there needs to be more competent people running our financial institutions. Billions of dollars are being wasted by the process that is in place. We are college educated, professional people that have been extremely successful in business. The fact that our income has drastically changed for the time being is the reason we are unable to meet our obligations. It will take a few years to rebuild our finances, but this has been a lose lose lose situation for the bank, the investor and for us. There is not a rational reason why things are being handled in such a haphazard way???? It makes no sense???? I have called and called Citimortgage to try to work out a resolution and they do not have any sense of urgency to work with us. I will just have to see what we can work out at mediation.