I have been with Countrywide Mortgage for 8 years. This is not the first time I have had problems with them, it started the day we closed our loan. I had wanted to escrow my account, but after 6 hours at the closing table on Good Friday I gave in and agreed to sign the final revision of the documents even though they still had the escrow issue incorrect.
About three years into the loan I received a notice that my payments were passed due. This was totally incorrect, I had never made a late payment nor had I ever missed one. I worked for a mortgage company so I knew what to ask for when I called Countrywide. I ask them for a payment history and they proceeded to tell me it would take two weeks to receive it. I ask what computer system they were on and it was the same one we used so I told them to do a control H and it would provide a screen print of the payment history that they could fax to me immediately. They agreed to do so.
Upon review of the payment history it showed that they had six full payments sitting in a "suspense account" and had not been posted to my account. Because of this they were charging me late charges and reporting my payments late to the credit bureaus. I finally got them to realize what they had done and they did post the payments, but did not recant the late pays to the credit bureaus.
Another 3 years went by and in January I received a letter from the Bastrop Tax Office returning my check that I had sent in for the property taxes. I called them and ask why it was returned and they said that the taxes had already been paid. I ask who paid them and they said Countrywide. I told them that I did not have an escrow account, and if they could return the money to Countrywide because they had paid them in error. They said that they were not able to do that, so I called Countrywide to advise them what had happened and I was told in a very snotty manner by the woman that answered the call that "if we paid them, we were supposed to". I told her that I did not have an escrow account and I had been paying my own taxes every year since I purchased the home. She said it didn't matter, if they paid them they were supposed to.
So, I took this money and put it in a separate bank account, because I really did owe this money for my taxes. I called my attorney and advised her what had happened and she told me to just hang on to the money because she was sure that they would discover their mistake and want the money back.in the meantime she had set a court date so that they would address the issue because we wanted to get this straightened out before it snowballed and caused more problems. Unfortunately, a week later the transmission on my court went out and I had to use that money to get a rebuilt on so I could go to work.
When we went to court the Judge ask the attorney that showed up for Countrywide why they had paid my taxes. He replied that they paid them because I had not and they didn't want a tax lien being placed on the property. The Judge showed the attorney the documentation that I had provided from the Bastrop County Tax Office showing that I had indeed paid the taxes, well within time, and that they had returned my check to me because Countrywide had paid them in early December. The Judge also asked him why they would pay them this year since they had never paid them before and my account was not an escrowed account. The attorney had no answer for that.
The Judge then ask me if I was willing and able to write them a check for the taxes that day and I had to tell him no and explained about my transmission. He said he understood and ask me how fast I could pay it back making monthly payments. I told him I could hopefully do it in three months, maybe four. He said that was fine, but he thought that I should have a year so that it wouldn't cut me short in case there was some other kind of emergency that arose. So, I started making separate payments to Countrywide on a monthly basis for the taxes. It took me five months and I had it paid back.
Believe it or not, they did the very same thing again in 2005. Yes, they paid my taxes again. Back to court we went, and fortunately we got the same Judge and he remember me. He sat there and almost laughed. He asked me again if I was prepared to pay the taxes on that day and I told him yes. He then advised me that I might as well let them set up an escrow account because it didn't seem like they were going to be able to get it right. He said this right in front of the attorney and the court gallery. The people rolled with laughter. I agreed to let them set up the escrow account because that was what I had wanted in the beginning and they couldn't get it right then either.
In January I noticed that I had too much money in my bank account. Upon doing the math, I figured out that it was the exact amount of my house payment. Wondering what was going on, I called my bank and they said that my Sept. 2005 house payment had not been cashed. Wondering why, I called them and was told that if the check was returned, it was supposed to have been returned, to not worry about it. This was obviously wrong! I wrote a letter to them which they did not acknowledge. I then wrote another letter and sent it certified, return receipt requested. Still no answer, but I know they got the letter because they had to sign for it. I ask my attorney what I should do and she told me to take the money and open up a separate bank account and put the money in there, so I did. I continued to make my monthly payments and Countrywide continued to accept the payments.
In April, Countrywide returned my payment. I wrote another letter, certified, return receipt requested, wanting to know why - still no answer. I put this money in the same bank account. They did the same with the May payment. Another certified letter was sent out, with no acknowledgment at all.
At the end of May a man came to my door and told my son that he needed to look under the sink in our kitchen. My son ask who he was and he said he was an inspector and needed to look under the sink. My son would not let him in the house and he called me at work. After talking to the man, I ascertained that he was a property inspector and I ask him what company he was working for and he said Countrywide. He said that they had been sending him out there every two weeks. This was unbelievable. I began to put two and two together, because I was in the same business and I didn't like what I came up with.
I called Countrywide and they informed me that my home was in Foreclosure and due to be sold in 7 days. SEVEN DAYS! I was mortified. I ask why, what was going on, and they said that I was four months behind on my payments. I was frantic to say the least. I tried to explain to them what had happened with the Sept. 05 payment and they said that they had never received it. I faxed them printouts of my payment record from Wells Fargo (my bank). Wells Fargo is the one that actually send out the checks for my bills. I even sent them a letter from Wells Fargo stating that the check had not been presented for cashing until 95 days after it was written. Checks are stale dated after 90 days and are no longer cashable. Countrywide contined to say that they had not received the payment.
After they reviewed the documentation that I faxed over to them they (a man named Earnest) did agree that "there does seem to be some question as to the application of the payments and they would have to turn it over to the research department to figure out". I said okay, then the sale will be postponed until they resolve this correct and he said NO! They could not stop a sale once it was in process for any reason. Unbelievable!
I even offered to make the payments right then over the phone and he said that they could not accept the payments. They said that there were foreclosure fees that would have to be paid. The three payments that were in the bank (that I agree I did owe to them) amounted to a little less than $2,400. The amount they said I owed was almost $6,000 which included attorney fees, inspection fees, late charges, bankruptcy fees and some miscellaneous fees.
They also told me that my payments were not the $713 that I had been paying but were $925. I ask when they changed and they told me three months prior. I ask why I wasn't notified of the payment change and they told me that they were not obligated to tell me that. I was supposed to check on that type of thing. I ask them if they realized how ridiculous that sounded, and they didn't even respond.
I called my attorney for help because it was obvious that they were not going to get this fixed in time to stop the foreclosure sale. She couldn't believe my story. She called Countrywide while I was there in her office and they said that they would not talk to her, not even when I told them she was representing me. She finally was able to get the name of the law firm that was representing Countrywide and she contacted them. First thing she said was that they could not charge me bankruptcy fees on a foreclosure, that was not legal. Neither were alot of the other fees.
To make a very long story a tiny bit shorter, even after working with attorney it has still taken eight months and things are still not completely resolved. We do have the payments straightened out and the foreclosure did get stopped. The attorney waived all the fees with the exception of the property inspections fees of over $800. Property inspections cost $20 max so that means that they were charging me for 40 inspections. That almost one a month for four years. This did not happen.
I finally agreed to pay the $800 just to get the issue resolved because it had already caused me way too much stress and had even put me in the hospital with what they throught was a heart attack. I just could not take anymore. I was shaking all the time, couldn't think, couldn't work, all I could do was cry. It was the worst thing that I had ever gone through. My attorney advised me to call them and make arrangements for paying the $800.
I called Countrywide the next day and they told me that they could not talk to me that my account was in foreclosure. I couldn't believe it. I started going through all of the same thing again with the girl on the phone and she ask me to hold while she called the attornies office. She came back on the line and stated that what I had told her was correct, but that their computer system was not updated, so I would have to wait and call back in a couple of weeks when the system updated.
I called back in two weeks and the system was still not updated. They told me wait until I made my next monthly payment and to call them then. I called them the next month and guess what, the system still showed me in foreclosure. I was trying to re-finance with Wells Fargo, and the foreclosure status was keeping me from getting an approved loan. They admitted that I was not in foreclosure but their system was still reporting it that way and they said they didn't really know how to resolve the issue. Again unbelievable!
Finally in December I called again and the girl I talked to said that there was no charges on my account to be paid. She said that property inspections were only $20 each and that the $800 had been removed from my account and to not worry about it, to just make my monthly payments and everything would be okay.
I requested a letter from them stating that all of this had been a mistake on their part so I could get this off my credit report. I did get a letter that stated something to the effect of "we're sorry for any inconvenience that has occurred. Sometimes there are computer issues that result in some erroneous information being transmitted". I sent this letter to all three credit reporting agencies and also to my loan officer. Two of the three credit agencies have removed the foreclosure from my account, the third has not. I don't know how long it is going to take to get my credit repaired.
My loan has now been approved and I am refinancing with Wells Fargo, but this has taken a drastic toll on my life and my body. I now have health problems that I did not have before this horrible horrible experience.
These people think they are God and that they are not capable of making mistakes. Boy are they wrong! They were rude, mean and ugly, not to mention wrong and illegal. They broke so many laws it's not even close to being funny. My attorney said that she has heard about things like this but never knew anyone that experienced it. She said that she reported this to several of her colleagues and they all said that this is the worst case that they've ever heard of. She said I should write a book. I would have to put it in the fiction area, no one would ever believe it if they hadn't gone through it with me.
Thank you for listening and don't ever finance with Countrywide Home Mortgage, they are nothing but horrible, awful, mean, nasty and stupid people. God forgive me, but I hate them with all my heart and soul. I think I have good reason.
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