When a person is struggling with their mortgage and looking for ways of addressing the struggles, there are many areas of concern that can come up. We discussed one of these concerns in a recent post, the concern of possibly falling victim to loan modification scams. Today’s post will be focused on a different type of concern, concerns regarding getting the right information.
The actions one takes in response to mortgage troubles or mortgage issues can have all manner of lasting repercussions. So, when deciding what actions to take, the quality and accuracy of the information a homeowner is basing their decisions on matters greatly.
Now, there are federal rules regarding what sorts of information mortgage servicers are supposed to provide borrowers when it comes to various mortgage-related matters, including matters related to loan modifications. Unfortunately, as a recent Consumer Financial Protection Bureau report underscores, borrowers cannot simply trust that mortgage servicers will follow these rules and provide them with the information they are supposed to.
The report found that violations of these rules, such as failing to give certain information to borrowers or giving borrowers information that is wrong or misleading, were being committed by some mortgage servicers. According to the report, technology problems were one common cause of such rule noncompliance.
As a note, the report did say that some of the mortgage servicer problems it uncovered have already been corrected.
One wonders if this report and ones like it will lead to mortgage servicers taking greater efforts to ensure that technology issues or other types of issues don’t lead to them being insufficient or inaccurate in their federally-required information-providing activities related to borrowers.
Given the challenges that can come up in getting accurate and sufficient information when trying to find the best way to address a mortgage problem, homeowners may want the guidance of a real estate law attorney experienced in mortgage-related matters when they are looking into how to address mortgage problems they have encountered. Among the things such attorneys can do are help such homeowners with understanding if they are getting the right kind of information to help inform their mortgage-related decision-making process, and, if they are not, give guidance on what efforts can be taken to try to change this.
Source: Reuters, “Some mortgage servicers break U.S. rules, mostly due to technology -consumer bureau,” Lisa Lambert, June 22, 2016