I am writing this letter regarding a company called Loan Modification Services, LLC, LMS Financial Services, LLC and/or Gary Correia (an individual) for fraudulent business dealings and unfair business practices.
A mutual friendreferred me to this Mr. Correia and his company to work with my mortgage companies in modifying my mortgage. The upfront fee was $2500.00 There was no formal contract signed between me and/or my company and Mr. Correia and/or his company. I did sign an Authorization to Release Mortgage Information which basically gives my consent for him to negotiate my mortgage with my lenders. Although we did not sign a contract or an agreement for services, Mr. Correia represented to me on many occasions complete satisfaction or a refund.
Prior to engaging Mr. Correia, he asked me for a statement of financial status so that he could review it to see if, based on his expert opinion, I would qualify for a modification. I sent the financial information to him and on the following day, he responded via email that I would qualify for a modification. Based on this representation I formally engaged the services of Mr. Correia and his company to negotiate my loan modifications. I then sent him a check for the up front fee.
Upon immediate inquiry, Mr. Correia advised that the process takes between 30 and 90 days. During the course of time I submitted all documents requested by Mr. Correia including a hardship lender as required by the lenders. I often called Mr. Correia for updates & to check in. After months of no progress I questioned Mr. Correia as to why it was taking longer than he initially proposed. His responses were generally in regard to the new presidential administration reforming the mortgage industry or problems with the lender response time. His responses to my calls and e-mails became increasingly sporadic & never timely. I expressed my dissatisfaction where he would tell me he didnt respond because he has no new update. My response was always, if that is the case, please advise the same. On many occasions our mutual friend had to phone or text him to actually return my calls/emails. At one point I got him to agree to send me an e-mail every Friday re the status, even if it hadnt changed. That never happened.
At this point in time, my financial situation was deteriorating so I needed to call my lender directly to arrange for payment at a local branch. On a hunch I asked the status of my modification. The representative advised they had no record of a modification in the works and in fact had no record of ever speaking to Mr. Correia. This drew a red flag because Mr. Correia had represented to me that he has been in constant contact with them. I immediately called Mr. Correia and advised of that conversation. He got defensive and offered a host of explanations: they dont have a clue, they got a whole new computer system, they have poor record keeping, etc. - but he assured me he was diligently working on my modification. I explained, well even if those things are all true, I am disturbed that if they have no record of it we are at square one. He advised he would call them and put me on a three-way conference call to clear it up. That never happened. I have been unable to actually speak with Mr. Correia since.
I enlisted the help of our mutual friend to contact Mr. Correia. He did respond to her where he said he was still working on it, told her the same story about the poor record keeping at my bank and assured her he was doing his best. She urged him to talk to me directly and he promised he would, but he never called me again. During these conversations between Ms. English and Mr. Correia, he represented that he would be happy to remit a full refund if I were unsatisfied.
After many attempts at contacting him and many unkept promised made to our mutual friend that he would contact me, I made the decision to sever the relationship. I sent Mr. Correia an e-mail formally severing our business relationship & demanding full and immediate refund. He did not respond but corresponded with our mutual friend via text messaging saying he would in fact refund me. About aweek or two late I received an e-mail from Mr. Correia where he wrote "I will refund to you the full amount you paid ($2500)." I never got the refund. During the course of the next month, I tried repeatedly to contact him via phone and e-mail. He again chose only to communicate with our mutual friend stating he had every intention of refunding me but "just didn't have it right now." That never came.
After that I left several voice messages and sent numerous e-mails asking him to contact me to resolve this issue to no avail. I even offered for him to make monthly payments. I got no response. The last e-mail or contact I received from Mr. Correia was on 5 months ago (April) when he wrote "I expected to have sent off your payment by now but have been unable to do so. I should have it out to you by FedEx this week. I will notify when I send it. I have all intentions of doing this I just haven't been able to at this point." I asked him to forward the FedEx info but got no response. During my repeated attempt to contact him via phone, he actually answered the phone but when I identified myself he asked me to hold & left me there indefinitely, finally just hanging up.
In May I filed a complaint with the Better Business Bureau in Atlanta. I received an e-mail from the BBB stating the company has not responded to BBB to date. I reeived another email from the BBB in Atlanta two weeks later advising they had made several attempt to contact the company but got no response.
I have since filed with various governing bodies, forums and every other consumer advocate institution I could. I will not let this go. I hired this man/company to help get me out of a bad financial situation and he but me deeper in there, especially expending the amount of time I must dedicate to recover this money!
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