You can find quick answers to frequently asked questions here.

You can access a series of helpful expert interviews, on foreclosure, short sales, rescue scams and refinancing here.

You can also connect to a counselor through United Way Housing, healthcare, family needs, financial counseling and emergency services by dialing 211.

We’d like to thank all of the non-profit organizations who have participated here and helped to make this blog a valuable community resource.

Homeowners will have an opportunity to meet one-on-one with their mortgage lender or a HUD-approved housing counselor. You can find out if you qualify for the, Obama Administration’s, Making Home Affordable Program or other options from your lender.

IF YOU GO:

Bring the following:
Monthly mortgage statement;
Information about other mortgages on your home, if applicable;
Two most recent pay stubs, documentation of income you receive from other sources or most recent quarterly profit and loss statement if self-employed;
Two most recent bank statements;
Account balances and monthly payments for credit cards and other debts;
Estimates of other monthly expenditures (such as utilities, insurance and medical bills).

San Jose Convention center is located at 150 West San Carlos Street San Jose, CA 95113

Parking is $7/day across the street at the Almaden/Woz lot.

Light Rail accessible via the Alum Rock-Santa Teresa and Mountain View-Winchester lines.

For more information:
• Homeowner’s HOPETM Hotline at 1-888-995-HOPE (4673).
• MakingHomeAffordable.gov or HopeNow.com.

We have a Condo that we might have to put on the market soon. We are
current and not underwater on the loan(barely). Back on 06 we refinaced
from a ARM to a 30 year fixed and in the process removed a lien from a
bankruptcy. The originator was WaMu who of course is no more. I don’t
know it for a fact, but it is likely that the loan was sold into a
security. Given the mess with conveying the notes properly from buyer to
buyer and title insurers starting to balk, should I be concerned about a
clouded title reducing the possible sale price of our unit?

Answer #1:
You should consult with your broker or agent on this issue. They should
be able to obtain a preliminary title report on your property to
ascertain if the lien which the bankruptcy court stripped off still
shows as an encumbrance on your title. If it does, you should consider
providing your agent with a copy of the order stripping the lien, so
they can present it to the title company to see if they are willing to
take it off as an exception to the report. If it is still an issue, you
may want to see if your bankruptcy attorney can help. He may need to
record the order.

Duane W. Shewaga
Senior Paralegal
Real Estate Fraud Unit
Telephone: (408) 808-3787
E-mail: dshewaga@da.sccgov.org

Office of the District Attorney
County of Santa Clara

Answer #2 :
f the lien was removed through the Bankruptcy, it is unlikely to still be on the title, however Bankruptcy doesn’t necessarily protect against judgments and liens.

The best thing to do would be to visit the county recorder’s office and pull a copy of the title on the home. The title report will list all the liens against the home. A title company can do this as well, but I am not sure if they charge and how much.

If the there is a lien on the home, it is not going to reduce the sales price of their unit, but may make them underwater. It also depends on the type of lien and what position it is on the title.

Hope this helps

Visit our Blog for great money saving tips!
www.BuildWealthNotDebt.com

Cassandra Molina
Team Leader
SurePath Financial Solutions
Consumer Credit Counseling Service
80 N. Wood Rd Suite 200
Camarillo, CA 93010
Phone (805) 383-7700 ext 256
Fax (805) 914-1735

When: Saturday December 4, 2010 9:00 am – 2:00 pm

When: Immaculate Heart of Mary Church 1100 South Center Street in Santa Ana, California

What: In the midst of the housing foreclosure crisis, New America Media (NAM) and the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) in partnership with Neighborhood Housing Services of the Inland Empire, Inc (NHIE) and NeighborWorks are organizing a “Free Foreclosure Prevention Workshop” offering detailed information for homeowners who are in foreclosure now or worried about it in the future.

Attendees can share stories with journalists and the media about the foreclosure crisis and get answers to their questions from housing counselors. Also scheduled is a selection of informational seminars about surviving the crisis covering topics including “Am I A Victim of Fraud,” “Can My Home Be Saved From Foreclosure,” and “Should I Talk To my Lender.”

Attendees should bring copies of the following documents to the workshop: a NHSIE Loan Modification Initial Packet, one month of paycheck stubs, two months of bank statements, a recent mortgage statement, a hardship letter, two years of your signed tax returns, one month of utility bills, your home mortgage deed and note.

Admission is free, food and refreshments provided at no-cost.

Some translation service will be available.

Public contact: To RSVP please call 951-530-1549.

Organizers: New America Media (NAM), based in San Francisco’s South of Market neighborhood, organizes the nation’s first and largest network of ethnic news services. Founded by the nonprofit Pacific News Service in 1996, NAM works tirelessly to get stories about and from African-, Asian-, South Asian-, Caribbean-, Indigenous-, Middle Eastern-, and Latino-American communities out to the mainstream media as well to more than 2,500 ethnic news outlets. NAM’s editor and journalists have won numerous awards and accolades for their reporting efforts. More information is available at www.newamericamedia.org.

U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development’s (HUD) mission is to create strong, sustainable, inclusive communities and quality affordable homes for all. HUD is working to strengthen the housing market to bolster the economy and protect consumers; meet the need for quality affordable rental homes; utilize housing as a platform for improving quality of life; build inclusive and sustainable communities free from discrimination; and transform the way HUD does business. More information is available at www.hud.gov.

Neighborhood Housing Services of the Inland Empire is a HUD approved non-profit organization that assists distressed homeowners in preserving their home. NHSIE is hosting various Foreclosure Intervention Orientations in Riverside and San Bernardino Counties in efforts to assist, better, and preserve communities.

NeighborWorks is the country’s preeminent leader in affordable housing and community development, working to create opportunities for lower-income people to live in affordable homes in safe, sustainable neighborhoods that are healthy places for families to grow. Headquartered in Washington, DC, NeighborWorks operates through a national office and eight regional field offices.

From the Fannie Mae Website:

“Fannie Mae’s HAFA provides financial incentives to servicers and borrowers who utilize a short sale or a deed-in-lieu (DIL) of foreclosure to avoid a foreclosure on eligible loans, which helps preserve the condition and value of the property by minimizing the time a property is vacant and subject to vandalism and deterioration.

The effective implementation date is August 1, 2010; however, servicers are encouraged to implement the Fannie Mae HAFA earlier than that date.
HAFA Program Summary

The Fannie Mae HAFA program simplifies and streamlines the use of short or “preforeclosure” sale and deed-in-lieu of foreclosure (DIL) options by incorporating the following unique features:
Complements HAMP by providing alternatives for borrowers who are HAMP eligible (including borrowers facing imminent default);
Utilizes verified borrower financial and hardship information collected in conjunction with HAMP, eliminating the need for additional eligibility analysis;
Allows the borrower to receive pre-approved short sale terms prior to the property listing;
Prohibits the servicer from requiring, as a condition of approving the short sale, a reduction in the real estate commission agreed upon in the listing agreement;
Releases the successful HAFA borrower from future liability for the debt;
Uses standard processes, documents, and timeframes;
Provides financial incentives to borrowers, servicers and subordinate lienholders.”

For complete information click here.

If this has happened to you or someone you know, keep in mind that many California cities, Like Oakland, have laws that can stop evictions. You can get free legal advice from your local Legal Aid Society.

Here are a few tips from our partners at the Legal Aid Society of San Mateo.

Click here for a list of other community resources you can tap for help with the Mortgage Crisis.

Here’s a link to a handy state publication detailing the rules for both tenants and landlords.

 Meet one-on-one with a HUD-approved housing counselor to discuss
your options to avoid foreclosure.
 Meet one-on-one with a lender to talk about how to better manage your monthly mortgage
payments.
 Get information and assistance on President Barack Obama’s Making Home Affordable Program™
and the City of Menlo Park’s Foreclosure Prevention Program.
 Learn all about your legal rights.
 Bring copies of all necessary mortgage and financial documents to the Foreclosure Resource Fair.

The fair will take place in the Burgess Recreation Center at 701 Laurel street, Menlo Park, CA.
For more information, please call (650) 328-1890.
Sponsored by the Office of Supervisor Rose Jacobs Gibson

Yes it is an emerging alternate strategy. Read the fine print very carefully. The most important thing for the prospective lessee/buyer is that the lease payments be close to what the future mortgage payment wd be, including PITI, and that the language around what happened to their deposit is clear and unambiguous. Is it non-refundable? If not, under what circumstances do they get it back, and how much of it do they get back?

What’s the lease term? 3 yrs? 5 years? What will be the future sales price? Interest rate? What

-–Sheri Powers, JD, MA, Homeownership Center Director, The Unity Council

A lease with an option to purchase real property is not a novel concept. But you need to review the terms of the option carefully and make sure you are dealing with a reputable seller. We have received a complaint at the District Attorney’s Office in which the consumer entered into a
lease with an option to purchase the property at a future date but after making several monthly payments the consumer discovered that the property was in foreclosure as the owner to whom he or she was making the payments was not paying the mortgage on the property.

- Duane Shewaga, Paralegal, Real Estate Fraud Unit, Office of the District Attorney, County of Santa Clara

Yes it is an emerging trend and there are different variations. One program is the Fannie Mae deed-for-lease program where the lender becomes the owner and leases the property back to family who was facing foreclosure. This would normally follow a deed-in-lieu of foreclosure agreement. The lender keeps their property occupied and receives rental income and the family does not need to secure new housing and can usually make more affordable payments.
- Michael Nord, CCCSSF

Forensic Loan Audits—What Are They? Should I Pay For One?
A “forensic loan audit” is a term that is being used to refer to someone looking over a homeowner’s loan documents in order to determine whether there is anything legally wrong with the loan. Companies and individuals that advertise this service promise to provide a written report of these legal violations, and that report is supposed to help the homeowner get a better loan modification or find an attorney who will file a lawsuit on behalf of the homeowner.

The problems with these audits are:

(1) The audits are frequently poorly done, with very little information in the audit report about what was wrong with your loan. The audit reports usually have a lot of canned, standard language that appears to be cut and past from one report to another and does not help you, the homeowner, very much.

(2) Audits are not always performed by attorneys, or the attorney involved does not have much experience in the area of mortgages, consumer rights, or mortgage fraud. As a result, the audit report can be inaccurate and a complete waste of money.

(3) Showing an audit report to a mortgage lender or servicer is not usually enough to get a loan modification. If you have real legal problems with the loan, you will need an attorney who is willing to work with you for the weeks and perhaps months it will take to get a positive outcome.

(4) Some legal problems with documents are not strong enough to pressure a lender or servicer into providing a loan modification. The people who prepare audit reports do not tell you that.

(5) Forensic loan audits are expensive – $1500 and more.

(6) You may be able to get legal assistance for free from Housing and Economic Rights Advocates (HERA) at 510 271-8443. Call for intake hours.

(7) You can get FREE LOAN MODIFICATION ASSISTANCE from HUD-certified housing counseling agencies. Visit HUD’s website to find the offices closest to you, at http://www.hud.gov/local/ca/homeownership/hsgcounseling.cfm

One more thing: This past year, a new law was passed in California that prohibits anyone – including attorneys, realtors and brokers—from charging or collecting any money from consumers for loan modification work until that work has been completed. If the forensic loan audit is being offered as a way to help you get a better modification, then the person or company offering this service cannot charge you money up front for this service.

For a list of places you can complain to if you have been defrauded, visit the following website of the California Department of Real Estate: http://www.dre.ca.gov/pdf_docs/FraudWarningsCaDRE03_2009.pdf

“San Mateo saw $155 million evaporate when Lehman Brothers went bankrupt in September 2008. On top of deep budget cuts brought on by California’s fiscal crisis, the loss on Lehman securities means San Mateo’s 735,000 residents are taking a hit.”

Read the full article here.