Chapter 13 can provide a glimmer of hope to homeowners struggling to make 2nd mortgage payments. Getting rid of a second mortgage mortgage in a chapter 13 bankruptcy has become routine in many jurisdictions like New Hampshire and Massachusetts. As a bankruptcy lawyer who has filed a couple of dozen of chapter 13s to strip...
The September 29, 2011 final deadline for the Emergency Homeowner’s Loan Program passed without much fanfare, but it left in its wake several hundred thousand mortgage holders who desperately needed financial assistance to keep their homes. Officials at the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) estimate that only about “10,000 to 15,000 homeowners...
The following article released on January 3, 2011 has been reprinted with permission from Huffington Post. Following the maxim that drastic times call for tepid measures, the banking industry continues to pay "lip service" to loan modifications while doing little. On Dec. 15, the Congressional Oversight Committee admitted the government's Home Affordable Modification Program (HAMP)...
Editorial note: This blog post ran 8/20/2010 on Huffington Post. It is reprinted with permission from Huffington Post. [caption id="attachment_191" align="alignleft" width="300" caption="Even with Federal mandates, foreclosures continue to rise."][/caption] When the economy crumbled in 2008 as real estate values plummeted, Congress was under pressure to appease the public's demand for action to stem the...