Consumer complaint received 2020-04-20
Product: Mortgage — Home equity loan or line of credit (HELOC)
Issue: Trouble during payment process — 
Company: Specialized Loan Servicing Holdings LLC (CA)

My wife, XXXX XXXX XXXX, and I, XXXX XXXX XXXX, are both reaching out to you to report an injustice that is happening to us during these uncertain times with the Covid-19 pandemic. We have also contacted the local Mayor of XXXX XXXX, the Governor of CA, our Congressman XXXX XXXX and Senator XXXX XXXX. The office of both the Mayor and Congressman reached out to us regarding our situation and escalated our case to the XXXX XXXX Consumer and Business Affairs Bureau. On investigator from the Consumer Affairs Bureau let us know to file this complaint with you. After doing some searching on the CFPB site ( your site ) I found that there have been over 1,400 complaints filed about the same company we are dealing with. I did find 5 recent cases that are almost identical to what we have been going through with this Specialized Loan Servicing ( SLS ). Case : XXXX dtd XX/XX/XXXX, case : XXXX dtd XX/XX/XXXX, case : XXXX dtd XX/XX/XXXX, case : XXXX dtd XX/XX/XXXX, and case : XXXX dtd XX/XX/XXXX. Again these were complaint cases I found on your site that are very similar to our case. Our intention is to note lose our primary residence as we have XXXX small children. Specialized Loan Servicing LLC ( SLS ) is asking us to pay them {$19000.00} or else they would move forward with setting a sell date on our home. Our first mortgage loan is with XXXX XXXX XXXX and we dont have any missed payments with them. The second loan, which we had no idea it even existed, is with SLS. SLS has had this loan for 8 years but has never sent us any communication previously and now they are threatening during these times. When we asked them to reconsider their actions during pandemic they said that it makes no difference and even questioned what pandemic? According SLS they have had our 2 nd ( home equity ) under their administration for the past 8 years and they have also admitted in several instances on a recorded line that they have not sent us one bill nor have they attempted to contact us regarding the lien on our property. Without any notice they have conducted dozens of home appraisals on our residence during the past 8 year and now that our home value has gone up, we have equity, they have threatened to foreclose unless we pay them what they demand. We hired an attorney to assist but unfortunately they have not been able get us a fair settlement and because SLS has placed a delinquency on our property we are not able to refinance our home to pay them their demand. SLS has offered a modification that should be considered extortion. The modification on the $ XXXX would end up costing us $ XXXX at the end of the term. Both my wife have pleaded with SLS and asked them to work with us, but their response is the same. They tell us that your home has equity you can chose to sell your home or pay us what we ask. We asked them to remove the delinquency so we can refinance and pay them but they refuse and hold it as leverage. We live paycheck to paycheck and live a simple life with our XXXX young children but SLS has taken advantage of our desperate situation. Their practices are unfair and based unjust. Why did they not contact us for 8 years? Why did they not give us an opportunity to make payments before placing a delinquent status on our loan and place a foreclosure lien on our property? Can Specialized Loan Servicing LLC ( SLS ) be investigated for their practice? How many more families have gone through this with them? How is it fair that they purchase a loan or service a loan but dont contact the property owners but continue to access interest, fees, and penalties? Here a quick history of what has happened : About 9 years ago both my wife and I filled bankruptcy because she was laid off from her job and at the time pregnant with our second child. During that time XXXX  XXXX XXXX was the loan provider for our first and second mortgage ( old XXXX  loan ). I had reached out to XXXX  XXXX  XXXX ( XXXX XXXX XXXX ) to see if we could modify the interest rate under the HARP program or any of the programs back then in XXXX as we had some financial hardship I was told there was nothing I could do since I made all my payments on time for 6 years and the only way I could modify my loan was to fall behind on payments.Give the bad advice and exhausting all of our savings, we decided to miss some payments so that XXXX XXXX XXXX would honor the loan modification. By that time we had cashed out my wifes 401k, borrowed money from family and friends, and maxed out our credit cards. We had no choice but to file bankruptcy ( Chapter XXXX ) and after the bankruptcy hearing, Chapter XXXX discharge, our first loan servicing was sold to a collection company called XXXX, a total nightmare to work with and a lot of dishonesty. When our first loan was being modified with XXXX XXXX XXXX I enquired several times about my second loan and was told not to worry and that the modification was all I needed to do to keep the house.Eventually the loan servicing for our first went back to XXXX XXXX XXXX  and since XXXX we have not missed any payments.For the past 8 years not once did we hear about the second loan and had no idea what happened to it. We assumed that after the Chapter XXXX discharge the second being a home equity went away. We pulled several credit reports and the second never showed up ; in fact it stated the loan was closed at XXXX  XXXX XXXX. We undeniable believed our second was part of the modification with XXXX ( now with XXXX XXXX XXXX ). We thought the HARP program reviewed our total debt and considered all of that prior to approving the modification.Since then we have had a XXXX child and my wife has not gone back to work. We decided childcare was too expense for XXXX kids and that we would try to manage our expenses as much as we could with one income. We have both agreed we wont be driving new cars, no lavish vacations, and very limited luxury to be able to afford the necessities. We live paycheck to paycheck and depend on some assistance from family at time. Currently we have a significant debt with credit cards, personal loans, and even had to borrow against my 401k. The money I make covers for the necessities but when things break around the house or some appliance needs replacement it becomes financially burdensome, but we try to manage as much as possible. We have not been behind any payments and mange to scrape by every month. Sometime in XXXX of XXXX we received a very disturbing communication from Specialized Loan Servicing LLC ( SLS ) which stated we have defaulted on the loan and that we are in danger of losing our home. This was an absolute surprise at a very difficult time during our lives. My father-in-law was diagnosed with XXXX XXXX XXXX months earlier and these were his last days. We were so very confused with eh foreclosure filing and threats that our house was going to be sold. We were still under the impression this loan dropped off after our bankruptcy and the ordeal with the HARP modification.was the first communication we had received from SLS and never even had one phone call from them.When we contacted SLS to see why they have not contacted us for 8 years and now threaten foreclosure their response was that they did not have too. They said since my wife and I had a Chapter XXXX discharge ( releasing personal liability ) they did not have to do any notification. After further questioning they did admit that our home now has a larger then debt equity so they have leverage to get me to pay or they would sell our home for a profit. When we logged into the SLS website we were able to pull documents that showed they appraised out home over 10 times in the past 8 years and waited until it had a large equity before they attempted to communicate with us. This is absolutely not fair to us as we had no idea who had our loan or that it ever existed. SLS took advantage of us and now wants to profit from it. We had never received a statement, letter, call, payment request, or acknowledgment from SLS that they had our loan. Even with the Chapter XXXX discharge they could have sent us a personal liability disclosure and let us know about the lean on our property. My wife and I hired an attorney from the XXXX XXXX XXXX to help mitigate the situation with the foreclosure. We did not have extra funds to pay-off SLS and were hoping we would refinance our home loan and get some funds from the equity to save our house. SLS has not agreed to settle on a lower amount, remove accumulated interest, remove fees, or remove the delinquent status so that we can refinance our home to pay them off. According to SLS our originating balance was approximately {$110000.00} 8 years ago and since then they have accumulated approximately {$45000.00} in fees and interest. SLS has offered a modification option to save our home that is totally unfair and unjust. They expect us to put down {$19000.00} and make {$540.00} per month payments for 480 months and at the end of the term pay them a balloon amount of {$93000.00}. This modification offer equates to {$370000.00} for the {$110000.00} we owed. This is simply outrages and they are taking advantage of the situation because they know we have XXXX small children and cant afford to lose our home. SLS gave us until XX/XX/XXXX to make the {$19000.00} payment plus the first monthly {$540.00}. They were supposed to call us last week to make the collection but they still have not contacted us. We are afraid they are purposely waiting so that they can say the modification is no longer on the table and take our home away from us. During these uncertain times it is impossible to make such a large payment. They are threatening to move forward with setting a sale date if we dont make the payment. My wife and I were going to borrow money from family and sell our jewelry to come up with this amount but with what has happened with the Covid-19 lockdown we can not do so. We clearly feel betrayed by SLS. There has been no communication, no intent to collect on debt, and false information provided. We have XXXX small children and one income. We are willing to take a loan out on our home to pay SLS but with the delinquent foreclosure status no company will give us loan. This is totally unfair as today we live paycheck to paycheck and are afraid we will lose our home during this Covid-19 pandemic. I should also let you know SLS has many complaints with the XXXX  and lawsuits for similar practices. We sincerely hope you can in any way assist or guide us we may keep our residence.