TIME TO BOYCOTT US BANK NEW MTGS UNTIL THEY FIX SHORT SALE DEPT!

 

Email address for Senior VP of US Bank Home Mortgage Default Administration is [email protected].  VP with US Bank Home Equity short sales is [email protected].  Senior VP for US Bank Home Mortgage is [email protected]  CEO of US Bank is [email protected] and his communications director is [email protected]

Our law team works with 300+ active short sales at a time.  We are MN based where US Bank has a large percentage of the market place.  Our experiences with US Bank short sales have been horrendous, at best.  Their entire corporate philosophy on short sale is adverse to the market place.  Comment directly to me by one of their VP's, "US Bank didn't make risky loans.  US Bank did not cause these problems.  It is not our problem to fix it."  As other major lenders and servicers see the short sale as a way to limit their losses, help US neighborhoods stablize, and get borrowers back into the marketplace sooner, US Bank's philosophy is that these borrowers are simply trying to use the short sale to get out of a debt they owe.  Our firm represents the sellers of over 500 of the top producing real estate agents in the southern half of MN.  We have recently notified all Realtors that we will no longer accept files with US Bank conventional first mtgs and any US Bank 2nds.  Since informing the Realtors, a senior VP of US Bank Home Mortgage Default Administration and a senior VP of US Bank Home Equity default administration have contacted me under the pretense of correcting the problems.  As we informed them of the issues from unknowledgable staff, inconsistent information provided by US Bank short sale employees and policies adverse to short sale approval possibilities, their response has been that we had done things wrong on every file and it is only us with complaints and that all other comments they have received regarding their short sales from the marketplace have been favorable.  Therefore, it is our view that these officials are simply writing emails to protect their positions at US Bank rather than deal with the issues.  The US Bank Home Equity policy to have a seller sign a new note acknowledging the entire deficiency before even opening the file for consideration is something that any attorney would advise the borrower to never do.  Make sure your short sale seller gets good legal counsel before signing anything.  US Bank is offering no "consideration" for the new note and there is no way for the borrower to know what the deficiency would be at that point because it is unclear in the beginning what US Bank as a second lien will be allowed from the short sale proceeds at closing.  The policy that US Bank will not open the file without at least $5k to them on the HUD also creates an immediate "bank against bank" impasse due to maximum contributions to second liens allowed by HUD, FNMA, & Freddie Mac which are investors on 80% of all first mortgages.  Therefore.  these are short sales that will never close and Realtors, homeowners, and potential buyers need to be aware prior to listing or purchase agreement that there is less than a 10% chance there will be a successful outcome before anyone wastes time, money, and hope marketing a property that will not close via short sale.  We feel that the only way to get US Bank to evaluate and improve their short sale department's customer service and change their policies that prohibit successful approvals of short sales is to make them feel it financially.  Many Realtors in the MN market are informing their US Bank loan officers that they will bring them no more buyers until US Bank short sale policies and services are changed.  With short sales fastly becoming 40% of Realtor's income stream, the real estate community has to apply as much pressure as possible on US Bank from all sides to create change.  US Bank's policies have sent thousands of distressed homeowners and their investors to avoidable foreclosure.  The  American neighborhoods are adversely affected by values dropping due to REO properties down the street.  People with foreclosures have years extra added to the time for getting "back on their feet."  US Bank is part of the problem in today's economic recovery, not part of the solution.  People need to close their accounts with US Bank and not use them as a source for new mortgages.  A single voice means nothing, but many speaking in unison can be heard in the market place!  Tell your clients, tell your fellow Realtors, write your congressman and senator, and tell your local press.  Email your issues to the above sources at US Bank.  Maybe if they get deluged with the same complaints, they will realize it is time to do something about the issues.

 

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Replies to This Discussion

Do other agents across the country agree with Wendy on this? 

 

Does the response of USBank vary regionally or state-by-state?  Or is this attitude/situation universal?

 

Has anyone dealt with them on short sales in the Pacific Northwest?

 

As described above, the USBANK reaction to short sales appears highly irrational.  Of course, they are  right to a degree:  they are not BofA/formerly AKA Countrywide.

But they are not pristine either.

I have 3 in process, one got approved in about 7 weeks, it was an FHA loan, one got approved in 2 weeks, it was a VA loan AND I have a nightmare out in cyberspace right now that I can not get an answer on and we are 8 weeks into it.  Mixed feelings here.

From a purely power politics point of view, a boycott makes no sense.  The listings go to agents who don't care or who don't know any better.  And USBANK gets to go to foreclosure without problems.

The far more rational (and ultimately more effective) approach would be to escalate every current problem transaction as far up the USBANK food chain as possible...documenting and thereby amplifying the egregious nature of their attitudes at the highest possible level in every case.

Then every unsuccessful case should be sent (with the sellers permission and cooperation) to the regulators, the chairs of both Congressional oversight committees, to your own local member of Congress and both of your state's senators.

Then you should send the same information to the most receptive local, regional or national talk radio host you can find  - and to the most receptive print media reporter or editor you can find.  Ask them to find out what Congress is doing about this trend.

Those are the only places where somebody has the kind of power these institutions understand.

 

One would think that the big brokerage mentioned at the top of this thread would have already done these things.

I agree Jim... I have invited US Bank to meet with a group that is meeting in California next month, alot of lenders are agreeing to show up.  They need to be part of the solution and not part of the problem.

The last 2 negotiators that I worked with there were AWESOME though.  Once you can get that far, it goes pretty smooth

Jim Hale said:

From a purely power politics point of view, a boycott makes no sense.  The listings go to agents who don't care or who don't know any better.  And USBANK gets to go to foreclosure without problems.

The far more rational (and ultimately more effective) approach would be to escalate every current problem transaction as far up the USBANK food chain as possible...documenting and thereby amplifying the egregious nature of their attitudes at the highest possible level in every case.

Then every unsuccessful case should be sent (with the sellers permission and cooperation) to the regulators, the chairs of both Congressional oversight committees, to your own local member of Congress and both of your state's senators.

Then you should send the same information to the most receptive local, regional or national talk radio host you can find  - and to the most receptive print media reporter or editor you can find.  Ask them to find out what Congress is doing about this trend.

Those are the only places where somebody has the kind of power these institutions understand.

 

One would think that the big brokerage mentioned at the top of this thread would have already done these things.

Exactly, Jeff.  Our firm does still work with US Bank on FHA and VA loans.  Two reasons, we have negotiators within US Bank on these types of short sales who know our files are complete and accurate and are willing to have them assigned right away to them.  Plus, US Bank must follow government short sale guidelines, which prohibits US Bank from using their archaic policies and corporate philophies to stall or close the file.  It is the US Bank conventional and all 2nds that are the problem.  US Bank even quotes "investor required" when we know for a fact that the issue is not an investor requirement, especially when investor is Fannie or Freddie.  We work with so many short sales, we know their guidelines and when they change.  It is shocking to me the number of times that even mgmt at US Bank has out and out lied to not work with or not approve short sales that meet investor requirements.  I know many high volume short sale Realtors and negotiators that refer to "the black hole at US Bank."

Jeff Payne said:
I have 3 in process, one got approved in about 7 weeks, it was an FHA loan, one got approved in 2 weeks, it was a VA loan AND I have a nightmare out in cyberspace right now that I can not get an answer on and we are 8 weeks into it.  Mixed feelings here.
The black hole, I like it :)  Most of the US Bank stuff in our area is VA or FHA or some govt backed loan.  They service Florida Housing loans too so they have specific guidelines to follow.

Wendy Haisley said:
Exactly, Jeff.  Our firm does still work with US Bank on FHA and VA loans.  Two reasons, we have negotiators within US Bank on these types of short sales who know our files are complete and accurate and are willing to have them assigned right away to them.  Plus, US Bank must follow government short sale guidelines, which prohibits US Bank from using their archaic policies and corporate philophies to stall or close the file.  It is the US Bank conventional and all 2nds that are the problem.  US Bank even quotes "investor required" when we know for a fact that the issue is not an investor requirement, especially when investor is Fannie or Freddie.  We work with so many short sales, we know their guidelines and when they change.  It is shocking to me the number of times that even mgmt at US Bank has out and out lied to not work with or not approve short sales that meet investor requirements.  I know many high volume short sale Realtors and negotiators that refer to "the black hole at US Bank."

Jeff Payne said:
I have 3 in process, one got approved in about 7 weeks, it was an FHA loan, one got approved in 2 weeks, it was a VA loan AND I have a nightmare out in cyberspace right now that I can not get an answer on and we are 8 weeks into it.  Mixed feelings here.

Jim,  I agree.  The issue of the new US Bank home mortgage boycott is simply that as a real estate professionals, you care about your clients, and there is no way I would recommend one of my buyers use US Bank Home Mortgage so in case of future financial difficulties, they would want to have a mortgage with a company that cares about being part of the solution.  I know many people with quick loan mods, easy short sales, easily obtained forebearance plans, etc with other servicers such as Citi and Wells Fgo.  Even BofA keeps postponing sheriff sales

to keep their REO costs down, allowing insolvent borrowers to stay in the property longer to get their lives back in order.  As per your other recommendations, these issues have been escalated to Senior VP's at both US Bank 1sts and 2nds with loan numbers, issues spelled out, etc.  Their response has been more of the same.  Zero issues resolved on about a dozen files escalated to them.  The files are now being escalated to the CEO and we will see.  The only "top of the food chain" person at US Bank that has expressed any concern on the issue is the Senior VP of US Bank new mortgages.  He clearly sees the issues as having a potential negative impact to his department.  The Realtors in MN are just now starting to communicate with their government representatives on the issue.  We have to date avoided involving the Mpls metro press in attempts to give anyone at US Bank the opportunity to even discuss the changes necessary before doing so.  So far, they just continue to "circle the wagons."  If I was the CEO of US Bank, I would find out who is responsible, replace them all, change the policies and get this wagon back on the right trail.  But he will not know who to believe unless more voices are heard. 

Jim Hale said:

From a purely power politics point of view, a boycott makes no sense.  The listings go to agents who don't care or who don't know any better.  And USBANK gets to go to foreclosure without problems.

The far more rational (and ultimately more effective) approach would be to escalate every current problem transaction as far up the USBANK food chain as possible...documenting and thereby amplifying the egregious nature of their attitudes at the highest possible level in every case.

Then every unsuccessful case should be sent (with the sellers permission and cooperation) to the regulators, the chairs of both Congressional oversight committees, to your own local member of Congress and both of your state's senators.

Then you should send the same information to the most receptive local, regional or national talk radio host you can find  - and to the most receptive print media reporter or editor you can find.  Ask them to find out what Congress is doing about this trend.

Those are the only places where somebody has the kind of power these institutions understand.

 

One would think that the big brokerage mentioned at the top of this thread would have already done these things.

AMEN Wendy!  Thank you for this posting! We do need to  stand together and make a change! Unfortnately I have 3 files in with US Bank now...I will be emailing everyone now, and NOT accepting any short sales where US Bank is the lien holder.

Thank you for the email addresses of the executives a US Bank. I currently have a short sale going with US Bank, they asked my client to apply for a loan modification, otherwise she would be held responsible for the deficiency balance. She declined the loan modification since she has had 4 people in a 1 bedroom loft home. the negotiator at US Bank then asked us to put in writing that my client was waiving her HAFA rights. By the way, HAFA guidelines states that choosing not to proceed with a loan mod DOES NOT disqualify my client from qualifying for the HAFA program. I agree with the poster and think that the actions of US Bank are criminal. My clients can not afford the home, the homeowner has had a tremendous loss of income and they want to hold my client responsible and will force my client into bankruptcy. the actions of US Bank are deplorable.

total agreement, I'm closing my accounts with US Bank and removing over $100K of funds and credit lines...  they suck and I'm spreading the word :)

I've had 2 short sales go to foreclosure :(

Jim,

 

Sadly I agree with Wendy.

US Bank 2nd especially would rather have US Bank 1st lose lots of money and let the property foreclose before they would agree to take money on an un-collectable debt in this case.

 

What is irrational to us is completely rational for somebody who is pathological.

 

Jim Hale said:

Do other agents across the country agree with Wendy on this? 

 

Does the response of USBank vary regionally or state-by-state?  Or is this attitude/situation universal?

 

Has anyone dealt with them on short sales in the Pacific Northwest?

 

As described above, the USBANK reaction to short sales appears highly irrational.  Of course, they are  right to a degree:  they are not BofA/formerly AKA Countrywide.

But they are not pristine either.

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