Select Portfolio Servicing Reviews

When I started the modification, I owed $206,000 on my loan; when they were done I owed $214,000 because of added interest. I was just on a SPS website and found out that there are a lot of people who have experienced the same thing that I have. Something needs to be done about this company giving out false hopes and then adding more on to the mortgages.

On January 24, 2009 my husband and I agreed to option #1. We signed all the documents and started the modification, and at this time my husband became unemployed. The modification was supposed to be completed with the new principal balance and payment effective April 15, 2009; it was not completed. On May 15th, my company closed their office in Michigan and I was now unemployed. I called SPS and they said everything should be done by June, 2009.

We continued to make all payments they indicated that need to happen and finally on June 22, 2009, I received confirmation that the modification was completed. At that time I had been paying and continued to pay $975 per month which enclosed my mortgage, interest and escrow payment. In October, 2009, my husband and I were a little short on our payment for that month, I called SPS and they said that we could pay my mortgage & interest payment and not pay the escrow payment and if there is a shortage in my escrow, SPS would pay it and the shortage would be handled in 1 of 2 ways; 1 to pay the difference in full or 2, to spread the shortage over 36 months. I said okay and made only the mortgage & interest payment, and for the last 3 months I've been paying some of the escrow back.

On December 15, 2009, we received an escrow analysis that indicated a shortage and a new 2010 project escrow payment which was less than our current amount. I was happy to see this. On Saturday, January 23, 2010, I received our 1098 tax form from SPS which tells me how much we paid interest for 2009 and how much taxes and insurance was paid in 2009, and the tax form showed $0.00 for taxes! On January 25, 2010, I called SPS and was told "it was a business decision to not pay your taxes" What!?

I was never notified that SPS wasn't going to pay; our contract was never changed and then I found out that when we changed homeowner's insurance companies, they were refunded the payment and never paid the new homeowners insurance premium. They cannot give me any truthful information. First, they said they made this decision September, 2008; but they paid my taxes from our escrow account in December, 2008; then they said that they weren't paying because I didn't have a previous escrow account; we did. They are holding and accepting my escrow and not paying my taxes and insurance; they also are illegally changing our contract, neither my husband nor I agreed to any changes.

I was never notified that SPS was negligently not paying; neither was my city's treasurer's office or insurance company notified that SPS wasn't going to pay. How can they get away with this? Also, in 2003, Fairbanks Capital Corp., now known as SPS, settled with the FTC on behalf of consumers for $40 million because of deceptive serving practices and fraudulent practices regarding loans and servicing. Is there anyone else who did not have their property taxes or insurance paid from your escrow?

However, the incurred medical expenses, even with insurance, her time off from work and my lighter hours at work (to deal with kids and house stuff), proved to be too much for our already tight budget. We were going to lose the house. Our loan at the time wasn't too bad, 30-year fixed at 7.5. Manageable but left no wiggle room. We defaulted on our mortgage and were considering bankruptcy. Then, while trying to work out an agreement with the mortgage company, who was pretty helpful at the time, notified me that they couldn't do anything or make changes. My loan was sold in a lot to another mortgage company Select Portfolio Servicing.

So, I googled the name. A few bad reports, a few good. At the time, they didn't stand out as "horrible." Immediately I called them, explained the situation and the status of the loan they just bought. They can't talk to me for 2-3 weeks. They still needed to receive and review all my paperwork. In late Jan, early Feb of '09, finally spoke to them, explained the situation and that we were filing for bankruptcy. The person on the phone was very nice, said don't do bankruptcy until they've exhausted all options. They said with all the government programs and programs within their own company, they've been doing a lot of modifications.

Their main goal was to keep people in their homes and paying on mortgage. I told them I wasn't expecting a miracle or anything amazing. I just wanted the past due (a lot at this point) on the end of the loan and the interest at a more manageable level. I gave them all our financials, bills, income, everything they asked for. Our mortgage was supposed to drop from $1442 to $960 a month according to financials. Time for the contract.

They told us we would have to pay them a forbearance for three months in the amount the financials said we could pay. They were constantly saying they don't have our proof of income, so every two weeks, on a Friday, I faxed in my wife's and my paystubs and verified their receipt on the following Monday. I honestly can't even guess how many calls I made and how many minutes were spent on the phone with them. Every single step of the way I as told our income looked good, our financials were great, our payments were on time and were certified funds, we were prime candidates for the modification. At three months, they started telling me that they were doing so many modifications.

The review process was backed up and they were working day and night to get caught up. They constantly reassured us we were on the right track and all fit perfect for us to get the modification. They then said the best thing we could do was to keep paying our forbearance to keep up a good history of payment and intent.

At six months, we were told that our loan mod was up for review and in underwriting. Everything fits perfectly into whatever criteria they required and that we could expect a new contract in about three weeks. Awesome! Three weeks later, we received a letter of denial and were asked to pay the past due amount in 14 days. I called them. They said they couldn't verify our income! ***! I politely explained that we sent it to them every two weeks for approximately 4-5months. She said, "Oh, yeah, you did. It says you're income didn't match financials." We reviewed our financials and everything still matched perfectly! I was pretty upset at this point, but still maintaining some level of decency and she was so damn nice on the phone. It made me feel worse! She said we could resubmit our financials again, which were exactly the same. I said I've already paid you so much forbearance, six months when three were contract required. I don't feel comfortable sending more money until I know what's up. She said she would resubmit for modification and that no more money was required for resubmittal. Every time I talked to them since, I was told it's in review and to pay more money!

Three weeks later, we received another letter of denial. But they were so damn nice on the phone! Okay, so, I called SPS today to see where we're at. If any options are available to us and what our timeline looks like. They told me we were denied due to my proof of income having overtime. Okay, so? (This is different from the last couple reasons they have given me.) I have given them about 8-10 of mine and my wife's paystubs, our financials and proof of income perfectly match what I've told them we make. They said I average about 10 hrs of overtime per month. Why would this look bad? I don't count on overtime as it's not guaranteed but it has always been on my check stubs when I actually get overtime and I've never hidden it from them. But wait, there's more!

After hearing for months that my financials were great, we could afford and they would accept $960/month, they suddenly came back and said our financials were $1,800 negative each month! Now, how in the hell can our budget be $1800/ month negative? (No politician answers please) With my wife and I both working, our credit cards and debts paid off. We only have one personal loan and regular utility bills. We're in pretty good shape for the first time in years! I asked for the break down, SPS wouldn't give it to me. I said, "What about the 6+months of financials saying I can afford $960/month and you guys accepting that?" She simply reiterated we were $1800 short each month.

About of my wife's income. They said they never received her proof of income for the resubmittal process. Okay, she worked for one clothing store during the initial six months. Then moved to another store, she was making the same money, but has gotten benefits and vacation time, which was the main reason for her changing jobs. This didn't make any changes to our financials at all. All the income and costs/bills were the same. We never notified them of her job change! Here's the fun part, they insist we didn't submit her income, yet here the lady is, calling my wife's new job by name and reciting to me the approximate amount of her first paycheck! The only way they can possibly have this information is if they actually received the proof of income and entered it into their system! So the battle goes on. . . .

I am now staying home with my son who is no longer covered by insurance because of his age and is plagued with tonic-clonic seizures that are still not controlled. We submitted all paperwork that SPS requested on time, every time. All of our HAMP trial period payments were paid on time. We received the HAMP modification paperwork via UPS, and we were expecting the $565 or so that we were quoted at the beginning of the trial mod. Page 1 says "Congratulations! You are approved for the HAMP program!" and page 3 says "Your new modified payment will be $1165. per month." After 1.2 million calls to SPS and every single agent saying that they could not understand the reasoning behind it, they put it into a "review" for a week. I finally contacted someone that told me that my loan was actually owned by CSMC Heat, and they would not allow SPS to reduce the 9.55% interest rate. Something to the effect of "an S and P" on my loan... whatever that is. That was the modification.

So now, my 3-bedroom, 1-bath house is going to be sold for approximately $60K because they would rather have that than modify us into a payment that we can afford. I now know that homeownership is a scam. It's the American Dream? This has been a nightmare. I have friends that rent beautiful homes for $300 less than our payment. I have three sex offenders on our street, pit bull dog breeders, and dope dealers, but we thought that we could refinance, put up a privacy fence eventually, and at least have a dump to call our own. It was not meant to be. If you have SPS as a servicer on your loan, you might be one of the lucky 5% that are helped, if the number is even that good. If not, you're on the streets as we are. We have effectively been "priced out of the ghetto". They can have it. They want money, and they want it now.

We received a letter from SPS on October 14 (the letter is dated September 29) saying that they were proceeding. When I called SPS, their agent told us that our account had been referred to an attorney on August 17, 2009, which was during the time we were supposedly on our three month trial modification. I was also told that our September payment was in a suspended account and to cure our default, we needed to send $10,046 immediately.

Making the mortgage payments on time was a part of being considered for the loan re-modification. They also told us that it would take 30 days to be processed. We were never late during this period. We received a letter 90 days later, saying that we were not approved. We were not given a legitimate reason why we were denied. We were misled by Select Portfolio Servicing. I don't know what type of boiler room organization that SPS is operating, but they have made our mortgage situation worse than what it was to start with.

Then, there is the contract violations. Now, throughout the documents, there are three different amounts listed as the borrowed amount. None of which are true amounts since the first claimed bills that they did not pay - and they inflated the pay off amount of the former mortgage. In all, they added about $15,000.00 undisclosed. Plus, they also added unlawful fees in the thousands. Then, they tried to get my house to be sold at a tax sale so they could buy it without my knowledge, but that failed.

Select Portfolio Servicing acquired my mortgage loan as of March 2009 and already they have called and sent numerous letters/correspondence to me. I feel this is harassment for no reason since I am not delinquent on my mortgage. They have sent letters regarding my property tax owed. They are not helpful at all and plain rude.

We had an offer on the house in December, Select Portfolio advised the 2nd lienholder they would only give them a maximum of 1000.00 - which naturally they refused to release their lien for that amount. The people tried to work with the people and offered more money and Select Portfolio again refused to give Homecommings Financial more than 1000.00 because they said it was their right to do so. We kept the house listed, the agent lost interest, never had an open house or really tried to sell it despite us sending him better pictures and begging him to update the listing. Finally after 6 months the contract ended.

We hired another realestate individual, he tried to contact Select Portfolio on several occassions and could not get a response so he was not interested in selling the house. We advised Select Portfolio at this time they may as well go ahead with the foreclosure. A few more months pass, someone else from Select Portfolio calls us and says, we are auctioning the house on June the 9th. We said okay. We cancelled the lawn care (since this is a deed restricted community) and assumed they had done what they said. A few weeks go by and we get a registered letter from the county saying that the yard care must be done immediately or we will be fined. We call our lawn guy and ask him to deal with this immediately.

In the meantime we have kept the electricty running so the a/c can be on low and not let mold grow in the house and also keep the pool pump running. We go to the house a few times a week to do the pool maintenance and make sure things are running okay. Another guy from Select Portfolio calls us at the end of July and said it was scheduled for foreclosure on August 18th. This past weekend when we went to do the pool maintenance, someone had drilled holes in the pool cage and installed padlocks and changed the locks on the house. We assumed they had taken possession of it. I had the electricity shut down on the house and cancelled the yard guy "again".

I received a recorded call this evening from Select Portfolio asking me to hold. I held and after a while it just disconnected me so I called them back to see what was up. I got this inexperienced individual telling me we want to avoid foreclosure. I told them look, we have no money, we need you to foreclose on the house, you keep saying you are going to, you changed the locks, I have disconnected the electricity the house is now your responsibility. He tried to tell me I need to hire a realestate agent and try to sell the house. I told him, you changed the locks? He said well I could give you access again. I told him to forget it and just foreclose on the property, we have had enough of their games of prolonging this just to incur more interest charges on the debt. As it stands right now, I have notified the homeowner association that they need to contact Select Portfolio regarding the house.

I advised the guy on the telephone that we had a tropical storm here today and last night and the back door is flapping in the wind and may break but I cannot go close it since they have pad locks on the cage doors and changed the other locks. I have never been more frustrated in my entire life, you try to do the right thing and companies like this want to just take advantage of people that are in our types of situations. I get the impression they have been dragging their feet on this foreclosure since we have been telling them on many occassions to just do it, we are out of options and they just continue to do nothing but accrue interest charges against us. I guess it is their way of burying people and making money.

We pay approximately 180.00 a month for the maintenance on the property (which we cannot afford) until I disconnected things last Sunday, when we noticed the locks had been changed. They are wanting me to hook up electricity and maintain the property because they do not want to incur the cost since they thought it did not cost anything for maintenance. I feel now that they have changed the locks it is their responsibity not mine. I don't have the money to have the electricity reconnected since they want a deposit. My hands are up in the air, we just don't know what to do anymore, we have told them a dozen or more times to foreclose on the property and they just drag it out. What do people do in this situation?