Consumer complaint received 2018-10-05
Company: NATIONSTAR MORTGAGE LLC
State: HI
Product: Mortgage
Sub-product: Conventional home mortgage
Issue: Struggling to pay mortgage

Complaint:
Our mortgage company Mr. Cooper is misplacing and misappropriating our mortgage payments and then charging us outrageous late fees and legal fees because of their actions. On two different occasions we have had to make lump sum payments to make our account contractually current, but the same problem keeps happening. We were told it was because of confusion associated with the logistics of changing the name from Nationstar to Mr. Cooper. This is not our problem, we have done nothing wrong and are now paying the price because of the incompetence and greed of Mr. Cooper. We had been put into a loan modification with a payment we could easily afford and set up auto payments on the account. However, after Mr. Cooper botched the process two different times we are now told that the modification is off the table and that the missed payments are our fault, so we must pay thousands of dollars in extra fees. This is an avoidable situation ; the problem is that Mr. Cooper is not organized and is not willing to be held accountable. 

We bought our home with an adjustable rate loan that we did not fully understand through XXXX. My husband XXXX and I are both gainfully employed and were able to keep up with the payment as it adjusted and increased. In XXXX we were finding it hard to afford our bills since the payment continued to increase and we applied for and were approved for a loan modification through Nationstar in XX/XX/XXXX. This modification reduced our payment about {$900.00} per month and we set up auto payments through Nationstar so that mortgage payments would always be received on time. We were shocked in XXXX when we were told that we were behind on our loan because there had been a problem due to the transition from Nationstar to Mr. Cooper. Apparently, the auto debit was not occurring as was supposed to and Mr. Cooper was not recording the payments, even though we had made them to Nationstar. As a result, we had to make a large lump sum payment in XX/XX/XXXX to get caught up. Once we did this we were assured by the representatives at Mr. Cooper that this problem would not happen again, and that our auto payments were good to go. 

We were shocked for a second time when we found out a few months later that the payments were still not being withdrawn or applied to the principal of the loan. We also noticed that we were now being charged an outrageous amount of late fees and extra interest on top of the normal payment. For the SECOND time, we had to call in to Mr. Cooper to try and work this out and had to make a large lump sum payment. We were shocked at the inefficiency and incompetence of the Mr. Cooper staff. We decided that we would call in our monthly payments but were told that was not an option, and that the payments could only be sent in via wire transfer. We also questioned the legal fees and late fees that we were being charged but were told by their representatives that this was non-negotiable and that we owed this money since we had not paid as agreed. Our attempts at logical arguments went nowhere with their staff. 

Since that time, we have been told that our modification is no longer valid, and that we would need to re-apply for assistance and go through the whole process again. This is outrageous. We had an approved modification, we signed and executed all the necessary paperwork and gave them the authorization to debt payments from our bank. Due to issues with the logistics of their transition Mr. Cooper dropped the ball and the payments were not withdrawn or properly applied. We now face uncertainty and a bill of over {$13000.00} because of their actions. I find it hard to believe that Mr. Cooper " rebranded itself '' as the community lender who has the consumer 's best interests in mind. That is the exact opposite of what we have experienced.

Company response to consumer: Closed with explanation