Intro

We think of mortgage servicers as "banks" because they collect the money for your mortgage, but they are not lenders, beneficiaries, or banks. Mortgage servicers are middle managers that service your loan for the beneficiary that owns your mortgage, and mortgage servicing is a different business than mortgage lending. Mortgage beneficiaries make money by charging and collecting interest, which over the life of your loan will be more than the amount you borrowed. In the time of Dante's Inferno this was known as usury, an evil located somewhere between the seventh and eight circle of hell, but these days we accept it as a business. Mortgage servicing is not that. Mortgage servicing is the business of foreclosure.

Corporations function without empathy, similar to a sociopath, only focused on their own desires; in the case of all businesses this is making money. Because your servicer makes their money by foreclosure, they will try to achieve it at every opportunity. Since very few borrowers go willingly into foreclosure the servicer employs strategies to trick you. The nice person on the phone will bond with you over your hardships and then tell you your foreclosure sale is on hold at the exact moment the sale is happening. You are an obstacle between the servicer and their money, and you forget this at your peril. If you remember this you are forewarned and can act accordingly.

If you are in the middle of being manipulated and lied to by your servicer, this short e-book will be an "aha" moment. After being tricked into foreclosure, my clients are shell-shocked, wondering how they lost their home, realizing too late that they were the victims of a long sadistic con game by the servicer. The purpose of Six Servicer Tricks is to clue you in about this con game and warn you about the specific lies and tricks that mortgage servicers use on home borrowers so that you see them coming, so that you don't fall for these lies and tricks, and so that this doesn't become you. The purpose of this short e-book is to make sure you hold on to your equity and your home, or at least get to sell your property on your own terms. This e-book is for every person with a mortgage in California, and even beyond California, to be prepared and protect yourself from your servicer whether you are struggling to pay your mortgage or not.

Although this e-book is called Six Servicer Tricks, I've also included the tricks played by loan originators, trustees, investors, loan modification companies, attorneys and other peripheral players in the mortgage lending business, The tricks that servicers, and these other predators play, are the same tricks that have been played by confidence men and women throughout the ages. I've identified six main types, each with multiple examples, which I'm sure most of you will recognize. These are the tricks you should be aware of so that you borrow smartly, know the type of loan you are getting, and don't lose your property to foreclosure.