Consumer complaint received 2017-06-08
Product: Mortgage — Other type of mortgage
Issue: Trouble during payment process — 
Company: BANK OF AMERICA, NATIONAL ASSOCIATION (NJ)

A building I own had a major fire on  XXXX   XXXX ,   XXXX  . The city required, I have, of whats left of the building tore down and on  XXXX   XXXX ,   XXXX   I was left with just land  (  no more building ). My home insurance company issued me a check for  XXXX . Bank of America required me to put the  XXXX  I received from the insurance in a escrow account because BOA held my mortgage and wanted to insure this money will be put to rebuild the building. I hired a contractor  (    XXXX   XXXX   XXXX     ) to start the project and rebuild the building. The contractor reassured me, he was going to take all responsibility of getting my building back up and rebuilt ( including and not limited to hiring a architect, city permits, and everything involved in getting the building built  ) . The  contractor   (   XXXX   )  told me he believed that the insurance did n't give me enough money that he could get me more money from them and reassured me that if he ca n't get me more money that he will build the building the way i wanted it for the  XXXX  I received from the insurance company.  Contractor   (   XXXX   ) told me for that reason, he needed to contact my bank, explaining to me that its the banks responsibility to get the most I could get from the insurance company because they hold my mortgage and they have a lot of lawyers to go after the insurance company. The contractor also told me he used to be a insurance adjuster and that he was SURE he will get me more money if only he could speak to my bank ( of course that was all a lie ). I then trusted him thinking this man knows what he 's doing. So a few times I would get a 3 way call with (  XXXX   )  the contractor and BOA. BOA would ask me if I would give permission to them to speak to  XXXX , of course I said yes. Before  XXXX  started speaking to BOA he told me I could hang up now, so I did. This happened a few times. In my mind I 'm thinking he 's speaking to them about the insurance company  (  like he told me he would ) and about getting more money ( from the insurance co. ) because  XXXX  was not enough.   XXXX   XXXX    communication with me was great. Every time I called or text him he would give me  (  what I thought  )  the updates on whats going on with the city approving the project to get the building built.  Five  months go by and he continues to tell me stories on why the city is taking so long to approve the project. At this time I 'm thinking the contractors want to get this approved just as bad as I do so they could get started and get their money. I decided to call the city anyways myself and plead with them to speed up the project. In my surprise, when I called the city, they told me THEY HAD NEVER HEARD FROM THIS COMPANY (   XXXX   XXXX   XXXX   ) AT ALL! WHAT?! So I called up BOA to ask if the contractor was even getting anything done on their side. BOA tells me THEY ISSUED THE   XXXX   XXXX   XXXX  . .  XXXX   CHECKS EQUAL TO  XXXX  SENT DIRECTLY TO THEIR ADDRESS 5 MONTHS AGO! BOA never sent me even a single letter telling me they sent these checks. I NEVER gave BOA permission to give these contractors any checks, I ONLY gave permission to SPEAK WITH  XXXX . I did n't know they had all that money for 5 month or any money at all! So my next question was " was n't my name on those checks? '' BOA answered " yes, both my name and  XXXX   XXXX   XXXX  was on the checks ''. That means the  contractor  FORGED MY SIGNATURE and cashed it at  XXXX  bank 5 months before I found out!!! I put a police report right away in  XXXX  police department. I find out later that this same  contractor  was convicted of stealing $  XXXX   XXXX  {$65000.00}  XXXX  from another homeowner just a few months prior to doing this to me!     So this is my problem I 'm running across with the banks, BOA  (  Bank Of America ) issued checks equal to $  XXXX  ( {$170000.00} ) to the contractor that I hired but  XXXX  did n't tell me they had given these checks and I have NOT given BOA permission to issue any checks to anyone!!  Yes   BOA  owns my mortgage but I 'm still the owner of the house and should have a say on who gets the money or at least be informed that this large amount was sent out! The insurance money of $  XXXX  was put in a escrow account that I CAN NOT SEE ( ONLY BANK OF AMERICA COULD SEE THIS ACCOUNT ) meaning I ca n't log on and see  XXXX  taken out of the account. I only found out when I was told by the city they never heard from these contractors and realized that (  XXXX   )  the  contractor  been lying to me for 5 months and THEN called the bank, and I got the information about the  XXXX  checks issued for $  XXXX . BOA issued large checks,  XXXX  for {$150000.00} and another check for {$25000.00} equal to  XXXX  without my knowledge and without informing me that these checks was issued! I then filed a police report and started a fraud case with BOA. I was told that the fraud case would take  XXXX  days and should get my money back. 5 months later fraud case is still open and when I called a few weeks after that, they said they could no longer speak to me because I hired a lawyer. My lawyer tried to contact them on many occasions and no response from BOA on the fraud case ( of course this is costing me lots of hours of lawyer fees! ) The fraud case that I put in with BOA was never complete! BOA says they ca n't force  XXXX  to complete the fraud case if they do n't do it! Here I am a year and half later after I put the fraud case and still nothing is being done. I collected over {$10000.00} in lawyer fees and I 'm in the same place with this as I was when I found out a year and half ago. I believe both banks are in some degree responsible. BOA for issuing the check directly to them without my knowledge and  XXXX  for cashing a check for {$150000.00} and another check for {$25000.00} with a forged signature! Please Help!!   My lawyer tries to contact them on many occasions and no response I would like a answer on the fraud case from bank of america and   XXXX   XXXX  . I was told that if its discovered that it was not my signature that I will receive the {$170000.00} back into my escrow account. I DID NOT SIGN those checks and was not even aware they were given to the contractor. The fraud case never had a conclusion and if I did n't sign those checks I should have gotten that money back into my escrow over a year ago. I filed the fraud case with  BOA  almost a year and half ago and nothing was done. This time wasted with a fraud report that should 've been complete over a year ago cost me lawyer fees, and time ( when I could 've had my building built by now. about $  XXXX  a month of rent row I could 've been receiving and losing every month this building project is slowed down ).   Also because of this delay I ran out of money that I got from the insurance to help pay my mortgage until the house was built months ago. I stopped paying the mortgage just last month of lack of money. My building would 've been built by now if the fraud case was done in a timely manner. I need BOA to put a suspension on my mortgage until this resolved. BOA is already sending me foreclosure letters. I feel this was the negligence of both banks.  XXXX  bank should have never cashed those large checks without checking the signature to make sure they were in fact from me not forged and  XXXX  should have never sent checks to the contractors without my knowledge.