If you have/had a file with Green Tree you have no doubt experienced their hard ball under handed tactics and stone walling on your files.

To really understand how to beat them one must first understand their business model. When you understand their business model, their behavior makes complete sense.

They are first and foremost, a "debt collector", with the title, name, and "clout" of a FDIC Bank. There is a very small amount of banks/debt collectors in the country with that distinction. It allows them to be one of the "children" of the Federal Reserve System while operating like a common debt collector (basically with a bigger stick than most debt collectors in the area of mortgages) which most banks don't do. I am sure if you had any experience with them you have by now realize they are different from any other bank you have dealt with in the past on short sales.

This will explain their behavior:

They buy up bad 2nd mortgages and strong arm the seller's in short sale transactions to pay more than the industry standard to close the deal. This program (and its tactics) has been a financial win-fall for them because more times than not the seller pays. In the cases where the seller refuses to pay, they scuttle the deal and collect on Mortgage insurance (which is normally more than the 1st lien holder will allow), an almost "no lose" scenario for them. They hold all the cards (or so they think).

There are two strategies I would undertake simultaneously. Strategy one, the Congressional Route. Strategy two, hit Greentree where it hurts most (in their pocket book, your version of, "hear me now?"). Unless or until their "no lose" scenario is rocked off of it's foundation, will they play fair and give the home owner the needed assistance they deserve. Everyone else in the country is doing what they can to ease this nation back from the brink, Greentree should be no exception, instead they are using these unfortunate times to gouge the average American Homeowner.

The strategy that worked for me in the past is... after making it to the head of Recovery (Chris Porter) I found out that his negotiators were clones of his mindset (meaning, they are hard to deal with because, he is hard to deal with). They are doing exactly what Chris wants them to do. You will get no love from Chris. Chris plays the biggest and best game of hardball I have ever seen, bar none.

I wasn't able to get Chris to even continue speaking to me until I brought down heat on his boss "Mark Foley" (found him on LinkedIn) by way of my sellers Congress person, from there to the Dept of HUD, and from there to the Chairman of the financial committee, Barney Frank and then to Greentree (Mark Foleys office). Only then did Chris call me back and close the transaction.

Side note... You bring heat down on anybodies boss and all of a sudden they will start talking to you, almost like magic. lol :-)

Remember, this process is slow,  as would be any process connected to the wheels of the government. (That's just the nature of that beast, however, very effective and most agents won't take it that far)

The other route is more effective and faster. Remember I said hit them in their pocket book, here's what I mean by that. Most properties in the U.S. went through a system called M.E.R.S. (Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems) and were traded on the secondary market. The Net-Net on MERS is this. Through MERS, deeds were separated from the underlying notes to facilitate more efficient transacting (buying and selling) on the secondary market.

What most Americans do not understand is this. In most states, when the note is separated from the deed, the underlying debt is "null" and "void".

Realizing that they had a problem, (because in most MERS cases, the original paperwork doesn't even exist any more) in their haste, banks sought to re-create the lost paperwork through fraudulent measures (Robo Signing Mills). Because it was done so hastily most of the dates for required documentation happened out of order, proving the paperwork was fabricated. 

The point is, once you can prove to Greetree that they do not have clear title (or "any" title), you have more leverage than before, in the transaction and they will be more fair in their dealings with you because if you ran that report (COTA, Chain Of Title Assessment) up the flag pole, there's a possibility of them loosing their investment in your mortgage all together (and for them, that would be analogous to their nuclear winter).

I'll be blunt:

What if the lender (Greentree) is not "really" the holder of the note with the right to enforce any action, approve a short sale or force a foreclosure (and you could prove it through a chain of Title Assessment)? That would be a game changer in you and your clients favor. I almost guarantee they would start playing by industry standards in treating distressed homeowners more fairly.

I have a personal friend in this exact scenario about to stick it to Greentree because his mortgage was Robo-Signed and the dates are out of order, proving the documents were fabricated.

There is a woman in the state of Washington (who is an expert in doing COTA's and finding the flaw in the chain of title) that my buddy used to do his COTA.

Her name is Janet Reiner, her number is 432-940-9955. She runs a website called MIRSNOW.com her email is [email protected]. She also has a Facebook page by the name of I love Stopping Foreclosure. I found out that she was mentored in doing COTA's by a gentleman who wrote a national best seller on this subject by the name of Dave Krieger his book is called Clouded Titles. Dave is not very popular with the banks around the country at the present moment. lol

Anyway, hope this helps. Good luck in dealing with Greentree! Remember, the only game they know and understand is hard ball.

Please forgive any misspellings, this was typed on the run between meetings. :-)

Leonard Williams Sacramento

New Update!

Greentree tried to foreclose on someone with bogus paperwork.