“The most dangerous creation of any society is the man who
has nothing to lose.” – James A. Baldwin.
Two days ago, I went to the Citibank branch in Vacaville
about two Home Affordable Refinance Program 2.0 packages that its affiliate
Citimortgage sent me recently. I spoke to a bank representative I’ll call
“Mike.” I showed Mike my two refinance packages – one dated April 11 with an
interest rate of 4.25 percent and a monthly payment of $1,493. The one dated
June 12 had an interest rate of 4.125 percent but a monthly payment of $1,628, a
mere $100 less than my current monthly payment. He tried calling “Dave Grayson”
at the bank’s headquarters, sending an e-mail with copies of the good faith
estimates of both packages, and calling Grayson’s superior. After about 20
minutes of this, the time it took for me to finish my cup of coffee and scone
from a nearby coffee shop, I told Mike that I had to leave. He tried to get me to sign a paper from the
current refinance package, but I refused, saying, “I’m not going to sign
anything that commits me to this deal. Both this refinance monthly payment and
my current payment are financially unsustainable.”
Mike looked up from his desk and blinked. “Oh.”
I stared back. “Yeah, ‘Oh,’” I thought.
Mike said he would try to connect with Mr. Grayson at
headquarters. Later that day, Mike called me and said that the $1,628 monthly
payment was all I could qualify for but didn’t explain why. So, I’m frustrated.
I’m not the only one who’s frustrated. On a website I read
more than 640 complaints about Citimortgage, its lending practices, and
customer service, or lack thereof. I didn’t finish reading all the complaints
because I became discouraged and felt a migraine coming on.
If I can’t get at
least $400 knocked off my monthly mortgage payment, then I want to attempt
a short sale. If that doesn’t work, I’m walking. I didn’t come to this decision
lightly. I like my home, although it’s a bit small and I would like an attached
garage. I don’t want to move because I want to put down roots. I’ve moved
numerous times since college and want to settle down with my two cats.
I am trying to take advantage of the Home Affordable
Refinance Program 2.0 for mortgages owned by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. I have
a 40-year-fixed Fannie Mae mortgage in which the first 10 years is interest
only. The monthly payment, however, remains the same throughout the mortgage
term.
I hadn’t planned to buy a home so soon in my life. However,
a botched carjacking and fatal shooting in 2005 next door to my Fairfield
rental home changed my plans. I had to find someplace safe to live. A mortgage
broker convinced me that I could buy a home with no money down, and I qualified
for $300,000. I take responsibility in that I neglected the adage, “If it looks
too good to be true, it probably is.”
Actually, I had little trouble with my household budget in
the beginning of my mortgage in early 2007. In September 2008, the stock market
crashed and the housing bubble finally popped. Banks and brokerage houses
either went out of business or teetered on the brink of destruction. Then, in
2009, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger placed most state workers on three-day-a-month
furloughs, cutting our pay by about 14 percent. Then I had little, if any, dispensable
income for entertainment, clothes, or dental work. Buy a used car?
Fuhgeddaboutit! (Currently an additional 3 percent of my pay goes toward my
pension. I face another 5 percent pay cut as part of Governor Jerry Brown’s 2012/2013
budget proposal. With the ever-changing pay cuts and my having to use credit
cards to buy groceries, my situation is a hardship.)
I had hoped that the Federal Housing Finance Agency’s Acting
Director Edward DeMarco would relent and allow principal reductions for loans
owned by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. He still won’t budge, saying they would
hurt taxpayers and pose a “moral hazard” in which homeowners might intentionally
stop making mortgage payments to benefit from principal reductions.
Mr. DeMarco, have you considered that some homeowners are
putting the brakes on their mortgages because
they can’t get a principal reduction? That, because of illness or job loss
or other reasons, they can no longer pay what I call a financially
unsustainable mortgage? Get your head out of your … office and get a clue!
Look, I don’t want to hurt other taxpayers. And I love living in my two-bedroom town home in Vacaville. I just want to
save for a decent retirement when I turn 67 (never mind when that happens). But
when financial institutions like Citi make it difficult for people to
renegotiate their mortgages through its employees’ mistakes and its misguided
focus on the bottom line, I can understand why some homeowners are walking away.
It’s called having nothing left to lose.
Writing Diva
