Consumer complaint received 2023-05-15
Company: FIFTH THIRD FINANCIAL CORPORATION
State: GA
Product: Mortgage
Sub-product: Home equity loan or line of credit (HELOC)
Issue: Struggling to pay mortgage

Complaint:
This complaint applies to both a primary mortgage and a home equity line of credit. 

1st Mortgage loan # XXXX AND 2nd mortgage/XXXXXXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX Our hardship application goes back to XXXX XXXX XXXX and almost 10 months later, we still do not have a solution from Fifth Third. This is really puzzling and ironically has made our hardships much worse... Let 's think about this, it has been almost 10 months since we started the hardship application and our credit history has gotten much worse, interest rates are significantly higher, the real estate market is worse and the cost of homes has increased. Our hardship status is much worse now and we have fewer opportunities to purchase another home because the market is much worse. 

On XX/XX/XXXX I sent an email to Fifth Third pleading... Can someone at Fifth Third please give us a status update on flex loan XXXX XXXX workout? In that email I explained to Fifth Third that our hardship is now much worse for the reasons noted in the 1st paragraph above... so here we are on XX/XX/XXXX, and no one still has replied to that email! 

During the month of XX/XX/XXXX, we not gotten bad advice by being told by 53 : a ) I, XXXX, would have to wait 1 year before I can refinance the flex home equity loan into my name ; meanwhile another representative told me it would take 3 months and I still dont have the correct answer. 

b ) I was told that I had to get another quitclaim deed ( to make sure the title of the XXXX XXXX is not in my name ) which made no sense ; I told 53 that it made no sense but I wasted valuable time trying to get it done. And this person shared her own personal divorce situation and had to quitclaim the 2nd mortgage! but that has nothing to do with our situation which is different because ironically no one can tell me if my name is on the 2nd mortgage. So this advice put us into an unnecessary frenzy. 

c ) Fifth Third told us they can not email us the hardship application so we would have to wait for it to arrive in the mail, and d ) a bunch of other time-wasting phone calls with no one knowing what to do we could have saved at least a week which would have given us more time to come up with delinquent loan payments. 

In addition to this, the XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX was not processed correctly because it should have been in both of our names when we were married but is only in XXXX 's ( my ex-wifes ) name. I asked for a copy of the flex loan closing documents because we do not understand why my name is not on the loan documents ; if my name was on the loan documents it would be easier to refinance or qualify for the modification. Since both of our names are on the 1st mortgage, I see no reason why both names are not on the XXXX XXXX - and no one at Fifth Third could explain this error or point to a standard operating procedure to prove that this is allowable. And because of this error with both names not being on the home equity line of credit, Fifth Third put the house into foreclosure and we had to fight with them to get it out of foreclosure! What a waste of time. THIS IS A MESS and clearly was not handled correctly and is part of the reason for the ongoing delays that we have nothing to do with. 

Other delays were caused by Fifth Third asking for the same documents at least twice and some of the documents they asked for were never asked for ( e.g., our daughters birth certificate ) in the initial hardship application ; in addition, as early as XXXX XXXX we were told several times that they have everything to process the hardship application but we find out later they need more documentation and a couple of times, the application became too old and we had to refile. We called and spoke to 53 in the early part of XX/XX/XXXX and was told everything was submitted and they did not need any additional information from us - so we are very frustrated with this process... we have submitted documents at least 3 times already and each time we are told you have everything. 

We have met all of the deadlines to submit the required documentation to expeditiously process the hardship application. As noted above, we are now really in a serious hardship due to higher interest rates and higher home prices. Our hardship has gotten much worse : 1 ) My ex-wife wants to buy a home but has been forced to pay very high rental rates pending the processing of the application. 
2 ) Despite the divorce, the goal was to refinance the home in order to remove my ex-wifes name from the mortgage and home equity line of credit. 

We are extremely frustrated because our lives have been put on hold. There appears to be no sense of urgency and/or consideration for the circumstances Fifth Third has put us in... no one replies to emails or picks up the phone when we call. 

Just in case you are not able to receive our communication attempts, we are including the other 53 contacts hoping that someone at 53 will reply due to the urgency of our request and situation. In fact some of the recipients asked to be removed from the email! 

I also mentioned several times to Fifth Third to please understand that we want to remedy this situation as soon as possible since XXXX is planning to purchase a home and I need to refinance the primary home into my name and there was and still is no sense of urgency. 

It is shocking that Fifth Third does not appear to have standard operating procedures that detail what hardship documents are needed when the first hardship application was filed all the way back in XX/XX/XXXX! 

This is really getting ridiculous to ask multiple times for the same and new documentation for the hardship application filed in XX/XX/XXXX. This process is very frustrating. 

In addition, XXXX is having difficulty purchasing a home because of the impact of this long process on her credit report - at this point, 53 should do a goodwill deletion of all negative credit reporting on our credit history. 

The real issue is that the mortgage needs to be refinanced/modified so XXXX 's name is no longer on the mortgage which is what we tried to do after the divorce but Fifth Third told us I would have to wait about a year to show payment history. And as noted above, now rates/home prices are higher and XXXX has been trying to buy her own home but we are at a standstill because of this situation. 

XXXX XXXX was our original contact person and then after sending emails to him and many other representatives, we later find out that XXXX is on another assignment but we had to ask why was he not responding in order to find that out and someone at Fifth Third should have emailed or called us and said XXXX is no longer handling our account. But the fact that XXXX is no longer our contact is not a good excuse because I included many representatives on the email distribution including XXXX which is the general email for hardship applications and even with that no one replies. 

Because of this huge mess, our credit has been negatively impacted and will get worse if Fifth Third decides to refinance at the much higher interest rates in effect today.

Company response to consumer: Closed with explanation