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Loan Modification

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Last Entry: February 15, 2011 at 19:26:59

Beware of Mortgage Deficiency Claims

Posted on February 15, 2011
In recent months, I have seen a decided increase in the number of mortgage deficiency claims. A deficiency claim, as you may know, represents the difference between the outstanding balance on a mortgage note and the fair market value of a piece of property...

50 States to Investigate Foreclosure Robo-Signers

Posted on October 13, 2010
Attorneys General and mortgage regulators from all 50 states are joining forces to investigate robo-signing of mortgage foreclosure documents and other defects in home mortgage foreclosures. “We believe such a process may constitute a deceptive act and/or an unfair practice or otherwise violate state laws...

HAMP Program Failing Miserably in 2010

Posted on August 28, 2010
Approximately 16 months ago, President Obama made a pledge to help 7 to 9 million families avoid foreclosure. Well, the most recent statistics for May 2010 have been released and the statistics confirm that the HAMP program is failing miserably. Since that time, more people have been kicked out of the program (over 435,000 families) [...

Mortgage Servicer Foreclosure Fraud

Posted on June 08, 2010
Countrywide, number one offender, writer of the most sub-prime mortgages (the list goes on) admits bilking homeowners, in foreclosure, and even including those who had successfully completed Chapter 13 cases, usually filed to avoid foreclosure, out of tens of millions of dollars...

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What Is Strategic Default?

Posted on May 18, 2010
Default means, not carrying out your end of an agreement, like, not making house payments on time, which usually leads to a foreclosure. Strategic default refers to homeowners who have the money to pay their mortgages, but choose not to. Most foreclosures are due to higher house payments, or lower income, or both...

Are Foreclosures Really Slowing Down?

Posted on May 14, 2010
Are foreclosures really slowing down? This question was answered. According to Realty Trac, the answer is yes. It seems the number of foreclosures that were filed were down by 2% over last year. So, what we are really playing is a numbers game. This statistic doesn’t mean that people aren’t losing their homes, it only [...

Foreclosures Avoided By Forgiving Principal?

Posted on May 07, 2010
Bank of America becomes the first mortgage company to SAY it will begin forgiving principal owed on mortgages to help homeowners avoid foreclosure. The program does not begin until May. You must have missed at least two payments, and, qualify under the HAMP program guidelines...

Missing Name in Notary Acknowledgment Really Means Bad Mortgage in Massachusetts

Posted on March 19, 2010
Incomplete notary acknowledgment can destroy a mortgage's enforceability against third parties Related posts:Name Missing in Notary Acknowledgment Means Bad Mortgage In Massachusetts Let’s Treat Massachusetts As A Judicial Foreclosure State Massachusetts Foreclosures In Jeopardy

Tax Fact 10-Mortgage Debt Forgiveness: Forms 1099-A and 1099-C

Posted on March 19, 2010
If your home is foreclosed, sold at a short sale, or if you give the home back to your lender in satisfaction of your debt, IRS Tax Fact 10 tells us to watch for a 1099-C or 1099-A statement in the mail during the next calendar year. Lenders are required to send the 1099 forms [...

Tax Fact 9-Make Sure Address Current With Mortgage Lender

Posted on March 18, 2010
Most home lenders, banks and government agencies are required to notify you and the IRS if they cancel all or a part of your debt. This is done by the issuance of Form 1099-C or, at times, Form 1099-A. By law, these forms must show the amount of debt forgiven and the fair market value [...

Tax Fact 8-Mortgage Debt Forgiveness for Property Not Principal Residence

Posted on March 17, 2010
As you know from the previous ?Tax Facts?, when mortgage debt is forgiven, it can be excluded from income if it is qualified principle residence debt, and you know that a qualified principal residence must be the main home of the taxpayer. What happens to mortgage debt that is cancelled on a second home, rental [...

Tax Fact 7-IRS Form 982 is Important

Posted on March 16, 2010
The IRS wants you to know, in Tax Fact 7, that you must use Form 982 in order to claim that forgiven mortgage debt should not be included in your income for tax purposes. IRS Form 982, entitled ?Reduction of Tax Attributes Due to Discharge of Indebtedness? must be attached to your federal income tax [...

Tax Fact 6-Cancelled Debt From a Refinance Can Be Taxable Income

Posted on March 15, 2010
In explaining tax on mortgage debt forgiveness, the IRS stresses, as tax fact number 6, that proceeds of refinance debt used for purposes, other than buying, building, or making a substantial improvement in the principle residence, do not qualify for exclusion from income if the debt is cancelled...

Tax Fact 5-Refinance Debt for Improvements is Excludable

Posted on March 14, 2010
IRS tax fact number 5 tells us that refinanced debt proceeds used for the purpose of substantially improving your personal residence qualify for exclusion from income if the debt is later is cancelled. In other words, if you re-finance your principal residence home mortgage and use the excess funds (the portion not used to pay [...

Tax Fact 4-Only Certain Mortgage Debt Qualifies For Exclusion

Posted on March 13, 2010
Mortgage debt forgiveness is considered to be income unless it is excluded. Principal residence debt has its own exclusion from income if it is cancelled or forgiven by the lender. To ?qualify? it must be what is defined by the Internal Revenue Service as ?qualified principal residence debt?...

Tax Fact 3-Debt Cancelled through Mortgage Restructuring is Eligible

Posted on March 12, 2010
The IRS, in listing ten important facts about mortgage debt forgiveness, points out that debt on a principal residence that is cancelled by restructuring the loan in cooperation with the lender can exclude it from taxable income. Subject to the two million dollar limit on the Mortgage Forgiveness Debt Relief Act of 2007, a write [...

Tax Fact 2-Mortgage Debt Forgiveness Exclusion Financial Limits

Posted on March 11, 2010
In order to qualify for full exclusion from income when debt is cancelled on the taxpayer?s principal residence, the amount of debt cancelled cannot be more than two million dollars for a married couple or individual; or if an individual is married but filing a separate return, the debt cancelled cannot be more than one [...

Tax Fact 1-The Mortgage Forgiveness Debt Relief Act of 2007

Posted on March 10, 2010
The IRS wants taxpayers to know about the Mortgage Forgiveness Debt Relief Act of 2007. In the waning weeks of 2007, Congress passed and President Bush signed into law this remedial legislation. Initially limited to tax years 2007, 2008 and 2009, the law was intended to prevent debt cancellation tax for unfortunate home owners who [...

Ten Tax Facts About Mortgage Forgiveness

Posted on March 09, 2010
Home foreclosure numbers are growing despite (inadequate) government efforts to stem the tide. Due to falling prices and a floundering economy more homes are likely to be lost in the future. The Mortgage Forgiveness Debt Relief Act of 2007 provides some relief from possible tax liability associated with foreclosure...

MERS Note Assignments

Posted on March 02, 2010
An investigation into a foreclosure defense will include tracing the rights to a mortgage and its underlying promissory note. MERS is very careful to only execute assignments of mortgages and not of notes. I’ve never seen it assign a note, and I’m reliably informed that MERS’ bylaws prohibit it from owning rights to a note...

Congressional Oversight Panel: Still Failing

Posted on March 01, 2010
The December report of the Congressional Oversight Panel comes as no surprise to consumers and their attorneys; TARP may have prevented a bigger financial crisis for the United States but it has failed to stem the foreclosure crisis Related posts:Watchdog Panel Says Few Getting Mortgage Help Propping The Door Open: Treasury Orders That Trial Modifications Won’t Expire Children Harmed in the Subprime Mortgage Crisis

Transferring Rights to a Note

Posted on February 28, 2010
Foreclosure defense requires tracing the rights to a mortgage to make sure that the foreclosing party has the right to foreclose. It also requires tracing rights to the payment obligation represented by the underlying promissory note, to insure that the foreclosing party is actually owed the money...

Can I Still Get the New Home-Buyer Tax Credit of $8000?

Posted on February 27, 2010
You can still get the tax credit for buying a new home, but time is running out. The much heralded tax credit for new home buyers was extended in November 2009. The tax credit is available to both first-time home buyers and homeowners who have owned their home for five years...

Second Mortgages and Bankruptcy

Posted on February 27, 2010
You can get rid of a wholly unsecured mortgage in a Chapter 11 or Chapter 13 bankruptcy case. In the Eastern District of New York, you can also do this in a Chapter 7 filing as well. In re Lavelle, Bankr LEXIS 3795 (Bankr SD NY 2009). A wholly unsecured mortgage is one where there is no [...

Is The FDIC Paying OneWest Bank Not to Modify Loans?

Posted on February 14, 2010
No, the FDIC is NOT paying OneWest a bonus if they avoid loan modification. Despite the allegations of a recently circulated internet video, the FDIC agreement with OneWest Bank does not provide an financial incentive to encourage short sale rather than the modification of delinquent home loans...

Mortgage Modification Fails Over $.40 Bank Error

Posted on February 13, 2010
Just when you thought you saw it all, here is the mortgage modification nightmare. This gentlemen and his wife are going to lose their permanent loan modification over a $.40 bank error. Despite hours and hours on the phone and re-assurance after re-assurance, nothing was done by Bank of America to correct their error...

January 2010 Sees 315,000 New Foreclosure Notices ? Up 15%

Posted on February 12, 2010
I picked up two newspapers today and one said the housing market is coming around, and the other said foreclosures are up 15% from the same month last year. The reality is the numbers don’t mean anything when people are losing their homes. In January 2010, over 315,000 households in the United States received a [...

Is There A Mortgage Double Standard: Commercial and Residential Real Estate

Posted on February 09, 2010
As a mortgage foreclosure defense attorney, it really burns me up that homeowners are once again getting the short end of the stick. There is a double standard going on in this real estate meltdown. Lenders are telling homeowners that they have a “moral obligation” to pay their mortgages, and the failure to do so [...

Chip Parker discusses walking away from your home on First Coast Connect

Posted on February 07, 2010
As the managing partner of the largest foreclosure defense firm in Northeast Florida and the only practicing attorney on Jacksonville?s Foreclosure Task Force, members of the media often contact me for my opinion foreclosure issues. Last week, I appeared on local National Public Radio (NPR) affiliate, WJCT, to discuss ?homeowner walk-away? with the host of [...

HAMP Not Working, And Big Brother Knows It

Posted on February 04, 2010
I am not the only blogger who bemoans the Administration’s feeble foreclosure prevention program. The Huffington Post has an excellent story on the failure of HAMP, due to not getting the mortgage companies to voluntarily reduce the principal balances...

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