Well, where do I begin after 3 years of thinking we were the only ones? What haven't they done to us? Back in March the nightmare began for me, but my husband had been having trouble ever since they went from Associates to Citifinancial.
My husband was married before me and had been having constant battles with this company. His ex-wife was constantly fighting with them about claims they made of non-payment and late payments, the same scenario over and over.
My husband divorced in May and was paying his $600.00 note every month (I might add that the payment was $580.00). Everything seemed to be running fairly smoothly. He got a cashier's check every month. It was hard for him, but this was his home and he always managed.
In March everything fell apart. They started phoning and harassing him, claiming he was 15 months behind in payments and owed unbelievable amounts of money. By this time I was in the picture, so I took over. A man he had spoken to at Citifinancial told my husband to send proof of payments from the 2 prior months, a W-2, 2 pay stubs and a hardship letter, and said he would straighten out this mess and try to get the payments lowered. I gathered all the documents and faxed them to this man, addressed specifically to him.
We waited and heard nothing. We tried contacting him, and nothing. Next, letters started coming in saying 15 months of payments were owed and threatening foreclosure, along with harassing and very rude calls every day, all day long, but we continued paying.
One woman my husband spoke to asked when he was divorced, then asked how long he had been living in the home and who he thought was going to pay his note. "I've been paying my note," he said, and she just became more rude. My husband was furious after this call.
Anyway, in December we sent the payment just like every month, only this time it came back rejected. The cashier's check was not accepted because we supposedly owed 15 months of payments. A couple of days later the sheriff delivered a paper: we were in foreclosure proceedings! This blew our minds. At first we figured we were finished, but I began to fight back full force. I ripped apart the whole house from top to bottom, gathering every check, bank statement, everything. For the checks I was missing, I went to the bank, spent hours with the manager and got everything I could.
We didn't have the money to hire a lawyer, but we took everything to one in town. He decided he would try to help us, and he did. We went to court, their lawyer saw our evidence and backed down. Great, right? That's what we thought.
We did win, and we weren't asking for anything. We just wanted to prove we were right and start making our payments again. We were to be reinstated and cleared with all creditors, and they were to give us an amount owing so we could begin paying.
It never happened! Oh, I forgot: before we went to court they admitted in their affidavit that they had lost the actual mortgage agreement. Upon further investigation we found out they had published an ad in the local newspaper looking for the whereabouts of this mortgage agreement, with my husband's name published in it. Meanwhile, I have a pamphlet from them on their privacy and confidentiality clause. To make matters worse, they hired people to come to our home, see if it was vacant and take pictures of our house on approximately 6 different occasions. Harassment, to say the least. This was all before court!
Our lawyer, being a small-town lawyer and not an expert in this kind of proceeding, suggested I get someone else, because we needed to be heard and they needed to be stopped. He couldn't believe nothing had happened. We even have 2 personal checks from May and June that had a letter attached claiming insufficient funds, but guess what: they never even went through the bank, only their mail room. When they were returned, my husband had already sent a cashier's check both times. I have so much that it's hard to remember it all. At one point, when our lawyer talked to their lawyer about the claim that we were behind from a certain date, their lawyer actually said, "Well, maybe it wasn't 2001, maybe it was 2000." I wanted to scream, but I had those checks too.
Anyway, a new lawyer came in and we thought it was time to go after them, so we did in December. Now we are in 2005, and in all this time the case has gone to state court, then federal, back to state, then back to federal. We have never been to court, and we received one document from the filing in the beginning and nothing else. I would call and call my lawyer with no response. Now, all of a sudden, the judge supposedly granted them the right to foreclose on us and dismissed all the proceedings we had against them. I found this out 2 days ago.
This roller coaster ride is not over. The emotional turmoil it has caused is almost more than I can stand. My husband's health is very bad, never mind the strain on our marriage, and we haven't even been married 2 years.
I wish there was a lawyer out there who could help all these people. We are out of money and in our 3rd foreclosure. This company needs to be hit with a class action lawsuit and put out of business for good! I won't give up! Not ever! At least I know we aren't alone!
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