homesmillbrae.com » Countrywide Financial

Banks Pay Big for Robo-Signing…Again

Mon, 07 Jan 2013 19:22:27 +0000

The settlement is the result of an independent foreclosure review ordered by the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency in 2011. It required banks to hire independent auditors to go back over loans from 2009 and 2010 to look for foreclosure abuses, but the reviews were taking too long and costing too much. (Read More: Mortgage Recovery Still Rocky.)

“When we began the Independent Foreclosure Review, the OCC pledged to fix what was broken, identify who was harmed, and compensate them for that injury,” said Comptroller of the Currency Thomas Curry in a written statement. “While today’s announcement represents a significant change in direction, it meets those original objectives by ensuring that consumers are the ones who will benefit, and that they will benefit more quickly and in a more direct manner.”

The banks, including Bank of America, Citibank, JPMorgan Chase and Wells Fargo, will make $3.5 billion in direct payments to borrowers and $5.2 billion in other assistance, such as loan modifications and forgiveness of deficiency judgments. Four other banks, EverBank, Ally, HSBC and One West, were involved in the talks but did not sign the deal. Together they service close to half a million loans. The OCC says conversations with them continue.

All 3.8 million borrowers, designated as those who were in any stage of foreclosure in 2009 or 2010, will receive something, regardless if they were wronged in any way, according to federal regulators. The loan servicers will divide borrowers into eleven different categories, and the regulators will designate a standard payment for each category.

Bank of America’s share will be the largest at just under $3 billion in direct payments and borrower assistance. Bank of America took on the ills of Countrywide Financial.

“We support the new approach because it expands the number of borrowers who will receive payment, speeds the delivery of those payments, and will provide support for homeowners still struggling to make payments and encourages continued community stabilization efforts and recovery of the housing market,” said Bank of America spokesman Dan Frahm.

This settlement follows a $25 billion deal last year with many of the same mortgage servicers and state attorneys general. So far that has resulted in nearly $22 billion in consumer relief and $4.2 billion pending to 300,000 borrowers through the end of September, roughly $84,385 per homeowner. (Read More: Forty States Sign On to Foreclosure ‘Robo’ Settlement.)

Article source: http://www.cnbc.com/id/100359672

Bank of America Slashes $4.75 Billion Off Mortgages

Thu, 15 Nov 2012 08:44:31 +0000

As part of the sweeping national mortgage servicing settlement that went into effect in March, officials at Bank of America said they are halfway to fulfilling their mandate of providing $7.6 billion worth of consumer relief.

The bank
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], which took on the burden of Countrywide Financial’s mortgage ills when it bought the company, has completed or approved a total of $15.8 billion in consumer relief for about 164,000 homeowners as of Sept. 30 and is on track, according to officials, to meet its total financial obligations within the first year of the three-year agreement. (Read More: How ‘Fiscal Cliff’ Could Affect Mortgage Interest Deductions.)

The settlement, which was supposed to right the wrongs of so-called “robo-signing” and other fraudulent mortgage servicing activities, credits banks for principal reduction, short sales, and other consumer relief, but the credits are not dollar for dollar. That’s why Bank of America’s $15.8 billion in relief so far is only half-way to its required $7.6 billion under the settlement.

According to officials on a conference call with reporters, Bank of America has approved or completed first-lien modifications for 30,000 customers, providing $4.75 billion in principal reduction.

In addition, 45,000 customers got home equity loan relief, totaling $2.5 billion. Finally, more than 62,000 customers completed qualifying short sales or deeds-in-lieu of foreclosure, which adds up to $7.4 billion in relief from unpaid principal balances on the loans. (Read More: Foreclosure Discounts Drying Up.)

Borrowers received an average $150,000 reduction in their first lien loan balances, resulting in a 35 percent reduction in monthly mortgage payments, according to bank officials. On second liens, the average relief through loan extinguishment to about 43,000 customers is more than $56,000 per borrower.

While officials would not give an exact amount, they estimated that 60 percent of the loans that received principal reduction were owned by investors and serviced by Bank of America, while 40 percent were held on the banks own books. (Read More: Bank of America Posts Profit.)

As for other aspects of the settlement, like providing customers with a single point of contact for mortgage assistance, officials said each bank representative is primary contact for between 70 and 75 customers.

All of the five banks that signed the National Mortgage Settlement are required to submit quarterly progress reports to the participating state attorneys general and the federal program monitor.

—By CNBC’s Diana Olick

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Article source: http://www.cnbc.com/id/49824237?__source=RSS*blog*&par=RSS

Notices of default up, foreclosures down in third quarter

Mon, 24 Oct 2011 13:28:45 +0000

The number of Napa County homes entering the foreclosure process
jumped 18.5 percent in the third quarter compared to the same
quarter in 2010, according to DataQuick, a real estate information
service.

A total of 263 notices of default were filed for Napa County
homes or condos in the third quarter, compared to 222 in the same
period the year before. It was the largest percentage increase in
nine Bay Area counties.

However, the number of Napa County homes or condos completing
foreclosure dropped 13 percent, from 131 to 114, quarter over
quarter.

“Napa County is not going down the tubes,” Susan Archer,
president of the North Bay Association of Realtors (NORBAR),
said.

Archer attributed the notice of default increase to a backlog of
distressed homes that banks are still processing.

Typically, a notice of default is filed after a homeowner is 90
days delinquent. But some homeowners might have stopped making
payments six to nine months ago — or more — and only just recently
received a notice, she said.

Banks haven’t been able to process all the distressed properties
effectively, Archer explained. “Now they’re moving forward, causing
numbers to increase.

“The (notice of default) jump is probably primarily from Bank of
America getting through of all these issues they’ve inherited from
Countrywide,” said Joe Brasil with Coldwell Banker Brokers of the
Valley. Bank of America purchased subprime mortgage lender
Countrywide Financial in 2008.

“They’ve done a significant release in the last quarter,” he
noted.

According to DataQuick, the most active beneficiaries statewide
in the foreclosure process last quarter were Bank of America
(14,325), Bank of New York (11,052), and Wells Fargo (9,740).

“I also think notices of default don’t really reflect what’s
happening in the marketplace,” Brasil said. Distressed homeowners
may stave off foreclosure using some kind of work-out plan with the
bank or short sale, for example. Or, “They can pull themselves out
of foreclosure entirely.”

“People used to want to call it ‘shadow inventory,’ but I think
banks have too much on their plate to process,” Julie Larsen of
Pacific Union International said. “Short sales are difficult,”
requiring multiple contacts with banks, lenders and other financial
institutions.

Another reason banks are taking longer to process foreclosures
is that it takes time to evaluate the reasons for each individual
home foreclosure, she said. Some people have lost jobs and can’t
afford the mortgage payment. Others can make the payments but are
underwater and simply want to walk away from the home and start
over.

“The banks (are) trying to muddle through that,” Larsen
said.

Statewide, after dropping to a three-year low in the second
quarter of this year, the number of California homeowners being
pulled into the foreclosure process snapped back to prior levels
over the last three months, DataQuick reported.

A total of 71,275 notices of default were recorded at county
recorders’ offices during the third quarter. That was up 25.9
percent from 56,633 for the prior three months, and down 14.4
percent from 83,261 in third-quarter 2010, according to
DataQuick.

Last quarter’s NODs, which mark the first step in the formal
foreclosure process, jumped back to levels seen earlier this year
and late last year. Notices peaked in first quarter of 2009 at
135,431.

“Figuring out what’s actually going on when it comes to
foreclosures can be a logistical nightmare,” said John Walsh,
DataQuick president. “In each case there are at least six or seven
different legal entities contending with each other, each with a
different agenda and timeline: The original lender, the homeowner,
the current owner or owners of the loan, the servicing institution,
the outfit doing the actual foreclosing, and the county recorder’s
office.

“The way it looks right now, it’s reasonable to expect default
filings to run at a somewhat higher level than we saw earlier this
year,” Walsh added. “Obviously, some lenders and loan servicers
have begun to plow through their backlogs of delinquent loans more
aggressively.”

Of the state’s larger counties, mortgages were least likely to
go into default in Marin, San Francisco and San Mateo counties. The
probability was highest in Sacramento, Madera and Stanislaus
counties.

Trustees Deeds recorded statewide, or the actual loss of a home
to foreclosure, totaled 38,895 during the third quarter. That was
down 8.4 percent from the prior quarter, and down 14.3 percent year
over year. The all-time peak was 79,511 in third-quarter 2008. The
state’s all-time low was 637 in the second quarter of 2005,
DataQuick reported.

There are 8.7 million houses and condos in the state.

Foreclosure resales accounted for 34.2 percent of all California
resale activity last quarter. Short sales — transactions where the
sale price fell short of what was owed on the property — made up an
estimated 17.8 percent of statewide resale activity last
quarter.

At formal foreclosure auctions held statewide last quarter, an
estimated 29.7 percent of the foreclosed properties were bought by
investors or others who don’t appear to be lender or government
entities. That was up from an estimated 28.3 percent the previous
quarter and up from 22.7 percent a year earlier, according to
DataQuick.

Article source: http://napavalleyregister.com/business/notices-of-default-up-foreclosures-down-in-third-quarter/article_aaf39192-fe0c-11e0-b39d-001cc4c03286.html