Delinquency Crisis Hits Reverse Mortgages

I have a HECM. I follow my city's payment information for quarterly tax payments. I save money from limited funds monthly to make these. Lots of questions now about this loan but never thought that it was wrong to pay my taxes following tax instructions that are mandated by the State Statutes and administered by the City and Tax Assessor. We are given a notice that advises us we have a 10-day grace period and that interest will be charged after the 10th day on the total amount due, back to the first. We are granted extensions to that 10 days when the City Council votes to do this -- usually at the end of the tax year. So, like all other thousands of residents in this town, I construct my savings and my trip to the Tax office based on that information. How could that be wrong? How would I know that was not acceptable to HUD or to my bank? No one mentioned this to me at any time when I was meeting with the lawyer, the broker, etc. No one put that in writing. No one indicated to me that I would be delinquent if I paid my taxes on day 2, 3 4, 5, etc. Yesterday I called about a situation that happened in May. BofA paid my taxes and I had an extension -- official like all other residents -- to June1. I went to my local Bank to reimburse the Bank. No good. They could not find my account number (it had been changed in May). Then they said call Seattle. Never knew about Seattle. Called. Oh yes, I could send my taxes to them. So, rather then asking the city to refund BofA, I sent $1234. to Seattle. I also wrote letters, called and sent copies of the City notices about the extension. Please return my fees and equity I said. Yesterday I got a 1098 and my tax money was applied to Mortgage Insurance for which I paid $4500K at closing. Why? Well, the explanation made no sense. Why not simply put the money back into principal and return small fees and a little equity? Nope. Because to do that, they would have to acknowledge that I paid my taxes. It was stressed yesterday that if I did not pay by the first I was delinquent (default) and of course then a 30 day period or 60 day period could go by before I even learned that I had not paid them. This is February 2011! No mention of this to me until the 1098 at the end of the year. I called HUD to clarify the payment policy and once they had my loan # I was disposed of by the representative -- almost hung up on I left word. No return call. Today I see this letter which in its own way makes me feel better. If they believe I am default, I guess I will find out in April. Meanwhile, I continue to pay taxes. However, I do not know what to do about the money I sent to FofA for taxes and they simply put somewhere else. What happens here is that they paid taxes for the quarter in May. They were due by order of the City on June 1. When I went to pay them, they were paid. I thought I could simply get this fixed by sending money. I guess not. There is evidently no good faith here.

Barbara Brandt of NJ 3:05PM February 05, 2011

To an elderly person needing extra funds, borrowing from their home equity may appear to be a good option. However, as memory problems increase these same people may not remember to pay their taxes, insurance, and other monthly bills. Required counseling will not help and reminders will go unnoticed when failing memory, dementia, or Alzheimer's are a part of the equation.

Tresa of CO 12:09PM January 14, 2011

well we can see in some place in europa in france the retirement and pension getting small every five years the unstable politic climat or menace of al qaida for sure can affect the invest is the responsability of the poltics to rasure and give confidences to the nation and the economy going up moe transparence and collaboration between the continent for the stability of the world financial ;;;;;and more control of immigration it seem hard to said but yes more control on the borders less confidences more interest less people get access to the properties and the financial world;;;;;Joelle esther benyayer between europa and united states of america a lot of efforts seem necessary after years of traveling more clarity;;;;and most of all where the capital come from also some shadows sometimes

joelle esther benyayer of WA 4:06PM January 11, 2011