In this article I really want to clear up a lot of confusion and misconceptions about the foreclosure process. A lot of times people see the word “Foreclosure” and stress out thinking that if they don’t pay off their loan, or catch up the loan, there are no options. Real estate agents sometimes think that if their clients are on the foreclosure list that it’s “too late” and give up. This is NOT the case.

Let’s start from the beginning:

• You are in the process of a Loan modification, or Short sale, and have not made your mortgage payments in several months. You could also have just stopped your payments because of a hardship, and were considering doing something before it forecloses.
• When this happens the bank will start to “accelerate” your loan. You will receive an acceleration notice from the Foreclosure attorney (hired by the bank) as required by law. This notice is giving you an opportunity to pay the balance owed plus some ridiculous fees. It tells you that if you do not settle your balance owed your home will be “sold at the court house steps”.
• At this point, there is no set date, they have just started the foreclosure proceedings. Then you will be receiving more notices from the foreclosure attorney that will eventually have a date on it. At that point, you are officially on the Foreclosure list. In Texas, the first Tuesday of every month is when foreclosure auctions happen.

This is where people get confused, both borrowers and agents. Just because you are on the “Foreclosure list” does not mean your house will be foreclosed, it CAN be stopped. Now let me preface this with no bank HAS to postpone a foreclosure, or take you off the foreclosure list. If you have an agent that knows what he/she is doing most of the time it can be pushed out. Most of our files are on the foreclosure list, but as long as we have an active short sale in progress with the lender, we get the lender to postpone the sale.

Also lenders such as: Citi Mortgage, Flagstar, Rushmore, Ocwen, and Reverse Mortgage Solutions (RMS) generally will not postpone the foreclosure date. You have to start a short sale as soon as you start missing mortgage payments.

Things you can do to get a foreclosure pushed out:

1. The first very thing is to speak to your point of contact with the lender and request a foreclosure postponement. If you do NOT have a point of contact yet, you need to call customer service and talk to a manager that can do it. There will still be someone who can do it. This may take SEVERAL calls and diligence on your side. These banks will tell you anything to get you off the phone.
2. Get the foreclosure attorney’s information to verify. This is the most IMPORTANT part. I can not tell you how many times we have been told by the bank “Yes it’s been pushed out”, “No there is no date” and it turns out that the foreclosure date was coming up. Learn from our mistakes and ALWAYS verify. Do not take the lender’s word for it.
3. Escalate! If the lender is not being responsive ESCALATE ESCALATE ESCALATE!  Of course every bank is different on how you can escalate the issue.

Sometimes this is a challenge in getting the foreclosure postponed, but this is definitely possible if you are doing a short sale!  If you are an agent, do not throw away a file because it has a foreclosure date, there are plenty of solutions for your client.

I cannot cover every single scenario in this blog, so if you have a specific question feel free to call our office directly at 972-342-0011 so we can help! Oyezz Real Estate specializes in Short Sales all over the DFW area. We have been in business since 2007 and we are here to help!