Consumer complaint received 2023-05-21
Product: Mortgage — Conventional home mortgage
Issue: Trouble during payment process — 
Company: LD Holdings Group, LLC (TX)

I am a homeowner that experienced financial hardship related to the Coronavirus ( XXXX ) pandemic and my mortgage isowned by XXXX XXXX . My loan servicer, loanDepot.com has consistently failed to inform me of and denied me the mortgage relief options as directed to my loan servicer by XXXX XXXX. 

Issues I was denied eligible relief options due to XXXX by my XXXX XXXX mortgage loan servicer loanDepot.com I was assessed late charges, other fees and penalties The delinquency for XXXX and XX/XX/XXXX was wrongfully reported to credit bureaus citing federal law as a requirement My credit score and my wifes credit score declined severely due to the delinquency reporting The Coronavirus ( XXXX ) directly affected my health and the health of my family during the period of time in delinquency and my ability to effectively maintain my household The Coronavirus pandemic affected the US Postal delivery of notices sent by loanDepot The Coronavirus pandemic affected loanDepots ability to effectively maintain the functionality of its online customer accounts The Coronavirus pandemic affected loanDepots servicing of my loan The Coronavirus pandemic affected loanDepots timeliness of notices sent if at all The Coronavirus pandemic affected my decision to change banks An accommodation of any payment assistance or relief was not made available to me in spite of being a consumer who was affected by the XXXX pandemic I have suffered financially and continue to do so as a result of the loan servicers failures Facts The monthly mortgage payments due to the loan servicer loanDepot were overdue for the months of XXXX and XX/XX/XXXX. Access to my loanDepot online account was problematic at this time. Although I had unenrolled from automatic payments in XXXX of XXXX, I also reversed it later that same month by re-enrolling ; however, the re-enrollment was not effectuated. If I had been aware that the XX/XX/XXXX payment was not received when due I would have immediately rectified the problem ; however, myself and the other four members of my household were struggling with infection from the Coronavirus ( XXXX XXXXXXXX ). The mortgage loan account was current before I was affected by the XXXX pandemic when an accommodation should have been made and during the applicable accommodation period the loan servicer, loanDepot.com reported the account as delinquent to the credit bureaus. After the mortgage delinquencies were reported to the credit bureaus, a mortgage refinance application at 3 % interest from a competing bank was subsequently rejected/declined. The refinance application had included a current appraisal at my own expense with an LTV below 80 % removing PMI. Multiple written PMI removal requests using LTV calculations based on the current value of the property were denied due to the mortgage delinquency credit bureau reporting. The payment for XX/XX/XXXX was received XX/XX/XXXX, and the payment for XX/XX/XXXX was received XX/XX/XXXX, XXXX loanDepots position has been we are required by federal law to accurately report the information contained in our records. In fact, pursuant to 31 U.S.C. 3711 ( e ), when reporting information on delinquent consumer accounts, the debtor must be notified 60 days in advance of such reporting to the credit reporting agency which was not done and there is no federal law which requires a loan servicer to report to consumer credit reporting agencies in spite of not following required procedures and after having violated the consumers rights. However, as the facts and the law in this instance will show that loanDepot is required by federal law to not report the delinquency information. 

The servicer failed to comply with the requirements established by owners or assignees of mortgage loans. These include, as applicable, ( 1 ) servicing guidelines required by in this instance XXXX XXXX ; Any financial hardship that impacts the homeowners ability to make mortgage payments as a result of XXXX, including illness to the homeowner or a dependent, is an eligible hardship that would qualify them for forbearance and/or consideration for other XXXX XXXX loss mitigation offerings . [ emphasis added ] If the credit obligation or account was current before the accommodation, during the accommodation the furnisher must continue to report the credit obligation or account as current. [ emphasis added ] To offer a forbearance plan in conjunction with a XXXX-related hardship, the Servicer must make good faith efforts to establish QRPC with the borrower in order to evaluate the borrower for a forbearance plan, including the verification of the borrowers hardship. However, we acknowledge that there may be scenarios where the Servicer is unable to establish QRPC and must offer a forbearance plan in compliance with applicable law without full QRPC. The Servicer is considered to be in compliance with our Guide when bypassing requirements in order to adhere to applicable laws and regulations. [ emphasis added ] A Servicer must make every attempt to achieve quality right party contact by : Determining the Borrower 's ability to repay the debt Early intervention with delinquent borrowers ( 2013 RESPA Servicing Final Rule ) was not followed by the servicer. Servicers must establish or make good faith efforts to establish live contact with borrowers by the 36th day of their delinquency and promptly inform such borrowers, where appropriate, that loss mitigation options may be available. In addition, a servicer must provide a borrower a written notice with information about loss mitigation options by the 45th day of a borrowers delinquency, which the servicer failed to do. 

The servicer failed to provide a continuity of contact with delinquent borrowers ( 2013 RESPA Servicing Final Rule ). Servicers are required to maintain reasonable policies and procedures with respect to providing delinquent borrowers with access to personnel to assist them with loss mitigation options where applicable. The policies and procedures must be reasonably designed to ensure that a servicer assigns personnel to a delinquent borrower by the time a servicer provides such borrower with the written notice required by the early intervention requirements, but in any event, by the 45th day of a borrowers delinquency. 

loanDepots failures to properly service my loan and adhere to the guidelines as prescribed by the CFPB, and XXXX XXXX has been extremely costly to me. As a direct result of loanDepot reporting to the credit bureaus, I was denied an in-process mortgage refinance with another lender at a rate of 3 % with no PMI that I was trying to finalize before the Fed rate increases began in XXXX. That loan was in process and was denied because my credit score declined the moment loanDepot reported the delinquencies to all three credit bureaus. I can provide a copy of that loan document upon request. In addition, all attempts to have PMI removed based upon the current loan to value of the home have been rejected citing the overdue payments as the reason for the denial. Finally, all other attempts to refinance my existing loan and significantly reduce my mortgage payment with a lower interest rate, no PMI through with other lenders prior to the Fed rate increase was not possible due to the detrimental impact of loanDepots actions to my credit score. 

Background Early in XXXX XXXX XXXX, formerly named XXXX XXXX prior to its acquisition by XXXX and where I have banked for many years announced it would be acquired by XXXX XXXX XXXX by mid-year. XXXX XXXX is the bank with my checking account from which the loan servicer auto drafted the mortgage payment. The XXXX acquisition by XXXX would create the same set of circumstances that transpired when XXXX was acquired by XXXX, requiring new routing and new account numbers and forcing me to update the account information of every financial institution interacting with my checking account. Because the inconvenience created by the acquisition was no different than that of changing banks, I saw this as an opportune time to switch to a different bank with a branch location closer to my home address. As part of that process, in XXXX I began to turn off all auto drafting because it can take one or two billing cycles to effectuate and, in the meantime, I could open the new account and immediately re-initiate the auto-draft. When I unenrolled from the mortgage payment automatic drafting using my online account for loanDepot I received an email confirmation message dated XX/XX/XXXX ; however, despite already having an existing online account, it was necessary at that time to register for a new account. I also received an email confirmation of that new account registration. Unfortunately, the Coronavirus ( XXXX ) entered my household shortly after turning off the auto-draft and once myself and my family contracted the Coronavirus ( XXXX ) the health and safety of my family was all consuming at a time when I and my wife were working full-time from home and each of our XXXX children were attending school online at home. It was decided after having discussed the matter with my wife to postpone switching banks due to circumstances surrounding the household and all things considered. I logged into my loanDepot online account and re-initiated the automatic drafting of my mortgage payments. Unfortunately, loanDepots email message policy did not apply at that time to failed attempts to establish automatic payments. I believed that I had successfully re-initiated the automatic payment feature and although I have no documentation to show it the problem was likely due to the required new online account. It should be noted that at no other time from the very first loan payment through today has a loan payment been late other than the months of XXXX and XX/XX/XXXX, which are the focus of this letter. 

It was during that period for the months of XXXX and XXXX of XXXX when the auto draft of my mortgage payments did not occur that the monthly mortgage payment for those two months were not received by the loan servicer, loanDepot.com LLC. I have no evidence to show whether the loan server was aware that the loan payments for the months of XXXX and XXXX in the year XXXX were overdue at that time. There have been so many changes to my online account with loanDepot that email records and bank statements do not date back to that period of time. I am certain that I do not have any emails, letters, voicemails, telephone calls, onsite visits from the Sheriff Dept., or any other evidence that a payment was missed at that time from loanDepot. I am also certain that I believed my mortgage payments were paid using the online automatic payment function and at that time, every member of my household and I was either infected with the Coronavirus, directly exposed to someone infected with the Coronavirus, and quarantined due to infection and/or exposure to the Coronavirus. My wife was facing hospitalization due to her life threating Coronavirus infection, and I was caring for my children who along with myself were also all sporadically infected with the Coronavirus. 

The truth is that I was not made aware regardless of whether an attempt was made of the overdue payments by the loan servicer and it was me, the borrower, that made first contact by telephone on XX/XX/XXXX, upon discovering an abnormally high cash balance in my bank account for the month of XXXX. After researching the matter and identifying the unpaid mortgage payments I also discovered that I was not able to access my account online using my new login username and password. This is an important point because I had just been required to create a new login name and address when I unenrolled from autopay. I contacted the loan servicer by telephone altering them to the problem, addressed the online access problem by resetting my password, initiated payments for each of the overdue amounts and addressed every question posed by the loan servicing professional. I received an email from loanDepot on XX/XX/XXXX, informing me that my password was reset and then another email minutes later informing me that it had been updated. The following day on XX/XX/XXXX, I received an email from loanDepot thanking me for speaking with them which included post message statement that they wanted to make me aware of all the mortgage assistance options that may be available to me. At no point during that initial conversation nor in the numerous instances Ive initiated contact since, did the loan server representatives inquire about XXXX concerns or mention the available relief options as directed by XXXX XXXX or the CFPB. It should be noted that I have inquired many times since XX/XX/XXXX with the loan servicer about options available to me concerning the reporting of the overdue payments to the credit bureaus and their response has been a consistent message that it would be unlawful for them not to report to the credit bureaus. 

Adding insult to injury, one month after receiving payment for the overdue amounts and having successfully re-enrolled in the auto draft, which requires an account that is current with no overdue payment ; I received an embarrassingly brightly colored foreclosure notice taped to the front door of my home. Five months later I received a letter dated XX/XX/XXXX informing me that my auto draft would commence on XX/XX/XXXX.