Consumer complaint received 2021-05-28
Company: Freedom Mortgage Company
State: CO
Product: Mortgage
Sub-product: VA mortgage
Issue: Trouble during payment process

Complaint:
I have a few complaints. First complaint is about how my lender handled a payment discrepancy in XX/XX/XXXX. I made my XXXX payment using the lenders online payment portal and unfortunately my bank returned that payment. As soon as I found out I remade a payment again through the online payment portal and that payment cleared. I then made My XXXX payment again through the online payment portal 2 weeks later and that payment cleared. In XXXX I received a letter in the mail from the mortgage company stating that if I did not pay the 2 months that I was behind ( XXXX and XXXX ) they would begin foreclosure proceedings. I immediately called the lender and was informed that in XXXX my payments increased by XXXX +/- due to a shortage in my escrow account and so my XXXX payment and XXXX payments were short. Both of those payments were stuck into a suspend account until I paid the XXXX. I informed the customer service rep that I made both of the payments through the companies online payment portal paying the exact amount it instructed me to pay. I paid the XXXX over the phone and assumed everything was good. A month later I found out that the 2 payments were reported on my credit report as being 60+ days late and I found out that I was charged additional fees from the lender call property inspection fees to have someone come out and make sure the house was still occupied for both XXXX and XXXX. I again called the lender and said I didn't understand why i was charged fees to check on a property that they knew full well was occupied because I had in fact made both of the payments and they had held them in a suspend account and I would like they pate payments removed from my credit report because again the payments were made and it was their company that had them in a suspend account. I was told there was nothing that they could do that they would not remove the late payments from my credit report and they would not refund any fees. 

Second complaint is concerning how the lender is handling my escrow account. Last year and this year the lender over paid my insurance company for my homeowners policy resulting in refunds. In XXXX I requested that the lender do an escrow analysis do to getting the escrow refund from my insurance company. They informed me they only do them once a year and I would have to wait until it was completed at the end of XXXX. When I finally received the analysis it was completely wrong. They were using outdated figures. As stated in the complaint above, my payment was increased in XX/XX/XXXX to cover a shortage in my escrow ( do to their over-payment of my homeowners policy ), but they were using figures from 6 months prior to that. They also had the incorrect homeowners policy amount. I emailed and informed them of this and included a copy of the Homeowners invoice that was previously sent to them from my insurance company and asked if they would please do a revised escrow analysis using the correct information. They responded and said it would take a little time since they needed to do some investing and that they would provide results by XX/XX/XXXX. I have since sent 5 emails asking when this will be completed and have not received any response. At this point by the XX/XX/XXXX when they go to pay my Homeowners policy and taxes they will have enough in my escrow to cover everything for the year and an additional XXXX plus all they remaining payments for the XXXX  year. This results in having an overage of approximately 750.00 more they the allowable excess per RESPA.

Company public response: Company has responded to the consumer and the CFPB and chooses not to provide a public response
Company response to consumer: Closed with explanation