Consumer complaint received 2022-07-15
Product: Mortgage — Other type of mortgage
Issue: Struggling to pay mortgage — 
Company: Freedom Mortgage Company (OH)

On XX/XX/XXXX I submitted an application for a COVID Forbearance plan due to my husband losing his job. We had also been keeping my daughters ( from my previous marriage ) with us all the time. ( I had shared parenting with my ex-husband ) as he was afraid to get COVID due to a weakened immune system. Although I am also a XXXX XXXX, I still wanted to try to give my daughters a normal life. They were exclusively attending school from my home for an entire year so bills were higher as he only pays {$150.00} per month which is the difference in the cost of their health care. He never paid anything extra for groceries, utilities, etc. I only applied for a 6 month forbearance as my husband was starting his own business. I called my loan servicer every month to try to communicate with them on the process & I also called a HUD counselor prior to doing this so that I understood the process. However, every time I called Freedom Mortgage the representatives I spoke with advised me NOT to make loan payments. When I called them told me that I would not make loan payments until I got my paperwork. This seemed normal during the initial 6 months. Then when I called in the 5th month because I still had no loan modification paperwork I started to worry. At one point I did have an escalated contact that had reached out. He seemed to be helpful but after a while he stopped responding. When it got close to my 6 month mark they indicated that there had been an error with my paperwork & that they had made a mistake with the interest rate & that due to the type-o that they had to send it back to be re-done. They also stated that due to high volume of people doing these forbearance plans that this was the cause for the delays. They also stated not to pay the mortgage & assured me everything would be fine. Even though my initial plan was to end on XX/XX/XXXX and my first payment was to be made XX/XX/XXXX and I called ready to make a payment I was told NOT to pay. They said that it would be ready for XX/XX/XXXX, so I waited and I called back. When I called back the next month though it was the same story all over again. There were more delays, the paperwork wasn't ready, I should pay & I should wait until the next month. This went on & on & on month after month. There were multiple delays explained to me by multiple agents & multiple times I was told repeatedly that my paperwork was either delayed due to volume of people that were doing forbearance plans or due to mistakes that were made on my paperwork. Multiple times I became worried and frustrated & asked to speak to a supervisor because this process didn't seem accurate. I didn't understand how I could request a 6 month Forbearance plan but have this process going on for so long. However, the supervisors ( or who I thought were supervisors ) would tell me the same things. 

Finally in XXXX of XXXX I spoke to someone who told me that even though I was not getting my paperwork if I wanted to get out of Forbearance I needed to start making my mortgage payments anyway. This was the first person that ever told me this. So on XX/XX/XXXX I made a payment of {$1300.00}. She told me to call back in XXXX to make another payment even if I didn't get my paperwork. I did call back in XXXX to make another payment and the next agent that I spoke with actually once again told me that there was something wrong with my paperwork that it was being sent back to Underwriting again because it was changing again & that if I made a payment that it would cause the paperwork to be incorrect & that I would be causing more delays. So once again I had people at Freedom Mortgage giving me conflicting information. I asked to escalate my call & so the next person I talked to that day did confirm what the first person said. They told me NOT to make my mortgage payment for XXXX. They said that loan paperwork had to be re-done due to my escrow account & that by me payment the mortgage it would have cause more issues. She also said that she was doing call backs & she could tell I was upset & frustrated so she offered to call me back. She sounded very knowledgeable & educated on the process so I did ask her to call me back but she never did. So of course I called back again in XXXX. This time they told me that everything would be ready for XX/XX/XXXX. I thought everything was finally going to be ready. I asked them why the prior associate never called me back. I asked them to look into the notes to see why she didn't call back. They said she wasn't even at a level where she had permission to do call backs to clients. At this point I really started to question things. So once again I asked to speak to a supervisor. When I was transferred I asked them if they were a supervisor and they told me that they were part of an escalations team. So I questioned them again & said so let me get this clear, every time I have asked to speak to a supervisor, I am being completely ignored & just being transferred to an escalations team? And the person told me yes. So I began to ask her questions. This time I asked her what her ID was. Her ID was XXXX and her name was XXXX. I asked her what my current interest rate was on my offer, that was when she told me that it was 5.1 %! I had no idea through all of this that my interest rate had changed. No one had ever told me that each time they were re-doing my paperwork I was getting a higher interest rate. When my original mortgage with Freedom Mortgage was 4.5 % and the interest rate that I had in XXXX was 3.1 %, I had never spoken to anyone about the terms of the agreement changing. So then I began to ask her about the program that was being offered to me. She had no idea what it was. She couldn't even explain it to me & had to put me on hold to ask someone else. I asked to speak to a supervisor & she wouldn't even allow me to speak to a supervisor. She was very rude to me & actually told me that I had to pay penalties & interest on the unpaid payments which isn't even true. This woman had no business taking calls with customers, let alone being on an escalations team. At that point I got off the phone & just decided to call back at another time to actually get a supervisor on the phone as I was on the phone for hours. So I did call back just prior to the XXXX XXXX  XXXX holiday. This time I did speak to a supervisor, her name was XXXX and I explained everything to her, and by this time I was in tears. She did explain to me that I was actually supposed to be making the payments all along if I wanted to come out of my forbearance plan & I explained that the representatives at Freedom Mortgage had improperly advising me for months. I only wanted a six month forbearance & I had been calling in every single month asking for help, asking for a supervisor, asking why my paperwork wasn't ready & asking why I couldn't begin making my mortgage payments & all along being told incorrect information. This isn't how this process is supposed to work & now I am suffering because of it. I now have much more money that I have to repay, I have a higher interest rate than what I had in the beginning & I am in a worse place that when I started this. This has caused me so much stress, my marriage is suffering, I can't sleep. She agreed this was completely unacceptable and she did submit an escalation to ask that my interest rate from XXXX be approved. She also told me that my paperwork was being sent back again for more changes though, so even though she was trying to help the same thing that has been going on is still happening. This place just can not get it together. Now they are saying that there are issues with my name. I sent in paperwork for my name change in XXXX. She also said that she would call me back right after the XX/XX/XXXX holiday but she didn't do it either. So I called back again this week and once again I escalated to a supervisor, XXXX who was very helpful and her manager, XXXX. This is the highest I have gone now within the company. The manager, XXXX did confirm that all of the escalations are in place that XXXX did submit but they don't have an answer as to if it has been approved. They said that they would return my calls but I have never once had a call returned yet from this company. I phoned the HUD line this week and had a counseling session with XXXX. I am calling in today to make my mortgage payment of {$1300.00} which is what XXXX the first supervisor told me to pay, the XXXX XXXX agreed that this was the amount I should pay. And when I had the counseling sessions with XXXX they said that I should file the complaint as this should never take this long. I feel that this program has been misrepresented to me. I asked for a 6 month loan modification and this went on too long due to Freedom Mortgage allowing employees who had no education on the process to take phone calls & advise home owners inaccurately.