I was a victim of Centex too, but not nearly as bad as some of you folks have described. For that, I consider myself lucky.
I refinanced with them in order to get away from another predatory lendor. I got an excellent rate for an ARM, which is all I was looking for. They delivered the product I applied for. My credit score was not the greatest, and subprime lenders can serve the purpose of providing loans for people in my situation, to buy a home. I have no problem with that. It is the deceipt and unscrupulous business practices that many employ, that I have a problem with.
Halfway through, I wanted to refinance with a cash out and when I tried calling my original mortgage rep, he never returned calls and was totally unreachable. I'd call, give the person answering the phone my name, and they'd come right back with some excuse. This guy was always in meetings or at lunch.
Finally, I gave up. I decided I wanted to be out from under them once and for all and made the decision to sell my home right before the ARM expired and a higher rate kicked in. I was fortunate enough to do just that. However, we did not receive the settlement statement until the day of the closing!
At that time, they assessed me a prepayment penalty, even though that prepayment period had passed. I was very conscious of that particular date, before I put my home on the market. Obviously in the lawyer's office, the day of a closing, when you have already moved out of your house and are packed and ready to go elsewhere, is not the time to dispute their claim. They kept $4K of my money.
I have since resettled in another state and will be hiring an attorney to review my loan docs and the settlement statement. If he finds that they are in the wrong, I will proceed to try and recoup the money. If there was a loophole that I missed, then I'm out $4K. They said they had extended my prepayment date and I had agreed to it. I'm 100% certain I did no such thing, knowing that I wanted to sell my house and move at the end of the ARM. I doubt they can produce docs with my signature, unless they somehow forge them.
I paid my mortgage on time with them, and had very few problems. I didn't like their customer service — it was hard to get a human to talk to. Yet, they called several times a month to see if I wanted to refinance. And I didn't like being jerked around by my mortgage rep. Clearly if he was ducking me, then he had something to hide.
I'm so disgusted by the stories I've read here about mortgage people, that I have decided to rent rather than buy. There have been way, way too many incidents of people getting screwed by banks and lenders. I am totally gun-shy right now.
Good luck to all who are pursuing cases against these companies.
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