Citifinancial
Home Equity Refinance Led to Foreclosure Papers and Lost Lawsuit

In May, Paula Stitt at the Citifinancial office in Colonie, New York contacted my wife Georgianne, offering to refinance our home equity loan. It was to be "on us, no closing costs" as part of a customer appreciation campaign. We decided to do the refinancing and had our closing on July 8. We left thinking it was a done deal.

Then on July 21 Paula said she could not send the mortgage payoff check as she was getting different payoff amounts from Texas. My wife had to call to get the payoff amount. She called three times and got an amount of $114,457.60, which was mailed out on August 4 by Paula Stitt, overnight UPS. There was a life insurance policy attached to the mortgage. After we consulted with an attorney, he advised us not to pay it, since it was in a class action suit and would be taken care of by the court.

On August 8 my wife called Citifinancial in Irving, Texas and was told the mortgage was paid in full and we would be getting an overpayment check of $275.16 in 30 days. Then we received a statement from them effective 8/21/03 with a $0 balance and $0 payment due, listed as "paid out". On August 27 Georgianne got a call from Paula Stitt warning her that a Kristina Parker from Texas would be calling her.

When my wife got the call, Parker told her that we still owed $10,867.20 on our old account. She did not say what it was for, just to pay it or they would not release our property. On a call to Texas on 8/29/03 my wife spoke to a Keisha P., who told her that our $275.16 overpayment was going to be applied to our insurance account and that the issue was going to be turned over to a manager for review. I would like to add that by that time the class action suit had been settled in court and they were not supposed to get any more payments for the insurance. Also, we never heard from the manager who was supposed to review the account.

My wife wrote to Parker on September 15, asking her questions about the money we were told we owed, and she also asked for copies of documents. She was ignored by Parker. We did not get a reply to the letter, only more threats. They had now gone to Citi, taking legal action. She also wrote to Ofelia Flores in Texas, asking questions about our account. These questions were also ignored.

We contacted the NYS Attorney General's office, the NYS Banking Department, and the FTC Bureau of Consumer Protection. The only help we received was from the Attorney General's office, who advised us we should get a lawyer. We also found out the life insurance policy they were trying to collect on was canceled effective August 4, a few days before Citifinancial in Texas received our payoff check.

On December 3 we hired attorney Warren Redlich to represent us. He wrote letters asking them to review our records because they had made a mistake, but as with our letters, he received no response from them. Then on April 29 we received foreclosure papers; my wife, son, daughter, and I each got one, and on May 1 we received three more by mail for my wife, my daughter, and myself. Shortly after receiving the foreclosure papers, they had the nerve to offer to pay us $250.00 to purchase our deed in lieu of foreclosure.

Our attorney was forced to file a counter suit against them in order to save our home. In the summer of 2004 our attorney got a call from a representative of Citifinancial stating they knew something was wrong and they would investigate. Several months later they completed their investigation, dismissed the alleged debt, and released our property (we did not receive the official "morsfaction " document until January).

Going back to the class action suit, in which we were part of the class, we were supposed to receive a settlement amount of $2,137.41. But in a letter dated January 28 they applied it to our unpaid account. In the letter they had our account number, which was our old mortgage account, not the life insurance, and we had a statement with a $0 balance. After they cleared up the foreclosure, we never got the class action suit money or the overpayment. The thieves do not feel they have to return it.

Our counter suit went to the Supreme Court in Albany, NY, and when our attorney was two days late with an expert witness affidavit, the judge dismissed our case. I would like to add that whenever the attorney representing Citifinancial did something that should have led to sanctions being filed against him, the judge refused our attorney's request. We wanted Parker and Flores deposed, but instead the judge told our attorney who he could depose at Citifinancial and had him fly to Texas to question someone who clearly did not know anything about our case.

We filed with the Court of Appeals in Albany and were also dismissed by that court. We are out probably a total of approx. $5,000.00, and Citifinancial gets to walk away clean as if they did nothing. We do not even get any answers as to why we were put through 5 years of hell. I really do not know who is worse in this case, Citifinancial or the Supreme and Appeals Courts in New York State.

I have put in complaints on Judge Doyle of the Supreme Court with the Commission on Judicial Conduct, and even with the information we sent, that was dismissed. I also intend to put in a complaint on the five Appeals judges, but that will also be dismissed, as one of the judges I am putting the complaint in on is on the Commission on Judicial Conduct. Nothing like a little conflict of interest in NYS.

Company: Citifinancial
Country: USA
State: Texas
City: Irving
Address: 3232 W. Royal Lane

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