Grateful Believer asked: Ok I’ll try to make this as short as possible (if it’s even possible)…
We have a first and a second mortgage on our home. I had developed somewhat of a friendship (via phone) with our broker over the years. He had done a 2 or 3 loans for me prior to the one’s I currently have. When we went into doing a good size remodel he did a 30 year fixed mortgage loan that was killing me financially during construction. So, during the end of construction May 05′ we refinanced into a Negative AM Loan and due to needing more $ to finish our project we took out a second in the amount of $25,000 ($20,0000 was what our contractor told us we needed for completion). The plan was that a Negative AM would give us a little extra cash if we needed it for the finishing touches. With this loan I could choose month to month to either make a Neg AM minimum payment, interest only payment, 30 year fixed or 15 year fixed payment. After a year we would refinance the 1st and 2nd into 1.
Well, I had called our broker 3-4 times in the months following the signing of papers concerning when the payment for the 2nd was due and for how much. 1st contact was about 1 month after completion of the loan to let him know I hadn’t recieved a statement for the 2nd. He said it was on his desk and he hadn’t gotten to it but will soon. I called at least 3 more times over the next few months and was told the same thing during the 2nd and 3rd contact. Then by the 4th contact he said don’t worry about it just appreciate it now. I thought ok I guess we’ll just deal with it later (yes, I know that sounds stupid and why would someone do that right?) I didn’t really think much of it because like I said we had developed somewhat of a friendship over the years. (And NO not sexual, I have never met the man in person and I am MARRIED)
A year came and went, then a year and a half came. I called him sometime in January or February 07′ to asked him when we were going to refinance the loans. He said let’s do it. I started the process of submitting all the paperwork and he ordered an appraisal which we paid for out of our pocket. The result was that we had plenty of equity to qualify but due to our credit scores at the time (which weren’t to bad but not great) he advised us to wait because the interest rates were continuing to drop and he was confident that we could get a better interest rate if we were to wait a little longer. We both agreed.
Another year went by. In January 08′ I called him again to start the process of refinancing. Again, I submitted the paperwork and paid for another apprasial. I shared my concern with him regarding the news of foreclosures and it making it harder for me to get refinanced. I let him know I didn’t want to lose my home. He understood my concern but was still confident and advised me not to worry. He wanted us to somehow cut our credit card debt down by 50%. He suggested to borrow money from our family or friends. Well, needless to say that was not possible. I don’t have any rich family members or friends that would let me borrow 6 or $7,000. This was so I could manipulate the balance of my close to being maxed out credit cards. So, that’s how we left it. I was to try and get my credit cards down. That was in March. I called him and July to let him know I wanted to get it done. He asked me to call him back next week. I agreed but didn’t. Not on purpose, but at my job, the summer is crazy.
Coincidentally, while our economy is going down the crapper, I recieved a phone call from him a couple of days ago letting me know we needed to come up with some kind of plan, he said I needed to come up with atleast $15,000 in 30 days!!!! If I do that he will wait on the rest so I can continue to pay down my debts and refinance me later. He told me if I didn’t, we would have to sell our house because, at this time I still have enough equity to pay him off.
So, after this long story my question is… can he force us to sell our home? I have been loyal in paying my 1st on time without default. I don’t have a problem paying him back, I did borrow the money. It’s not like I’ve ignored the 2nd completely either. I have looked through my paperwork and it doesn’t have any payment address or who to make the payment out to. Can he just all of a sudden demand this money to be paid to him? Can he force my family out on the streets? For a $25,000 debt I had inquired about a number of times and a first that has no default against it.
ENRIQUE
