Client lives in IL, husband awol, couple going thru divorce, husband and wife hate each other. There is about 150k in equity in house, divorce judge awarded wife 70%. Problem is husband put a “secret password” on Chase mortgage that he has not paid since March. When they call to collect $$, they ask her the password and of course she does not know and they can’t talk to her. Husbands name is on mortgage not wife. My question is…since husband is not responsible, if he misses and blows off court dates about the house, can the sheriff throw the wife and kids out before the redemption period is over because no one attended the court dates relative to the mortgage? the house is on the market with no success so far. She is out of money and living on credit cards. Husband may also end up in jail this week, on criminal matters. HELP- I want to buy the house and this is a friend. I was not sure about the laws and court dates and if they can throw you out before because he blows off court dates. thanks for your help!
If you have the account number and the SS number you can do it online.
I just did one, I didn’t know clients password so I filled out the email address and it asked me for password, when I messed it up 3 times it asked me do I want to renew password, so I did and made it my own: so now I can go on and check account and info.
TG
I tried the password thing and it blocked me. I wanted to know if no one goes to the court dates, can the sheriff throw you out early instead of the entire redemption period?
Has the wife sent over paperwork from the courts to the lender? That might help her to at least get them to talk to her. Ask her to find out from the lender just what, in light of the husband’s disappearance, she would need in order to be able to talk to them. Tell her not to accept the first answer she gets (unless it is ‘yes we’ll talk to you’). She can take it higher and higher until she gets somewhere. Someone at that bank or its corporate branches can help. One of the most powerful sentences I’ve ever learned was “I’ll gladly hold while you connect me with someone that can.”
Stay out of the automated systems or internet. Even the most basic online log-ins will ask you a series of questions if you don’t have the password, so you won’t get very far (as you saw). Unless you know the name of the missing husband’s pet frog, you won’t be getting in.
Yes, even if no one goes to court, the sheriff can and will toss them out when he is ordered to do so.
If the mortgage is not in her name, it won’t hurt her credit at all, so at best she should probably look into some of the emergency services which might available to her (shelter, financial assistance, etc) until she can get this straightened out or back on feet. Trust me it will be better to walk out than to be tossed out.
Thanks for your help. The lady is looking for the $$ in the house, its listed, to go on with her life, so she needs the house to sell to get the $ to move back to Dallas, where she is from. She keeps lowering the price, but the house is dated, doesn’t show well, it smells, and its in average condition and lots of competition in her area. Lots working against her.
Im not sure if its greed or desperation where they try to get 100% of their equity out of the house or not, but I personally would get money to get on with my life and move, but she is holding out because she has no other money and is living on a credit card.
This is her ex-husband’s final F***you to let her go down with the mortgage, etc. and its a shame he just checked out like this, with kids,he even turned off the gas at Easter and shut off all utilities in the house.
Can they throw her out before the sale date because no one goes to court dates? or does she have the typical 7 month redemption period???
What a prick (oops, can we say prick on this board :-[ ). Even if he hates her to the core, how can he do this to his own babies? >:(
A lovely feature of our state’s statue is that if the lender feels that the house is abandoned or that the house is being trashed, they can request that the court orders possession even before the judgement, which means that it is possible that she can be removed from the premises at any time. In Illinois it is very unlikely that she would be able to just live out the 7 months in the house, especially without any money. So this lady really needs to get her lawyer involved immediately. The law provides that the lender can set up a rental situation under some circumstances so maybe that could buy her some time. Whether or not her circumstances would qualify for this would be something for the lender to decide. With no money in hand, however, I am not sure what good that would do.
I wish there was better news to share. This is so sad.
Thanks for the good info. I was worried about the lender finding out that the person who has the mortgage no longer lives in the house, that they might call the loan due and throw her out. She has no job or no money and needs the $$ out of the house to move on, so its a double edged sword so to speak.
I am worried the husb will somehow have the lender throw her out or something like that. He already called the county cops on her and said that she had drugs and guns in the house with kids, so one nite 6 officers banged on her door with full artiliary and bullet proof vests and demaned to come in,her kids were crying and it was horrible. He called “anonomously from a payphone” and did that. Unfortunately I don’t see a happy ending in sight for her. I doubt her house will sell at the price she needs, and she will probably end up on welfare…
There’s been no change of title or death, so she hasn’t done anything to trigger the DOSC.
Wow, that is insane! That situation is slowly graduating to code FUBAR. If he is that treacherous, he will probably let the house go to foreclosure sale and there goes any hope of her equity. Sure, that means there goes his equity but it sounds like he prefers his payoff in her pain.
Is there any way that you can show her that there’s no way that she’s going to come out of this a winner? Doesn’t she have family or anyone that can put her up for a minute? If by some miracle she stands to get any money from this, leaving the house won’t really change that. She can stop by to get the mail and mow the lawn if she’s worried about someone claiming the house is abandoned.
For your own peace of mind and the productivity of your business, I suggest you lay out the true and realistic options (get her lawyer involved or get the heck out of there) in black and white for her, then wish her well and let her know that until she takes reasonable action there’s nothing else that you can do for her. I don’t mean to be cold but this situation has gone far beyond a potential deal, so not only can you not afford to get caught in the middle of a domestic cesspool, your business can’t really afford for you to spend too much more of your precious time on it.
On a side note, what part of Illinois are you in? I am in a small southeast suburb.
Hi
I am in Palos Heights. I work southwest and south subs and parts of the city. This happends to be my best friend (how ironic ha?) and its hard to see her go down like this, but it has been a good learning experience for me.
i don’t want to see her go broke, but I know there is no happy ending. Its hard for her to listen to me for some reason, even tho I know my facts.
Hey there RELinda,
I agree with deborahwells. I will try to offer a little help, but need some information on which to base guidance.
How far off is the auction date? Does she know the loan number and his SSN? You said her name is not on the mortgage, but is her name on the deed? Is the listed price too high? Are you knowledgable about short sales?
The listing agent can’t sell the property without the husband’s signature, so she likely knows how to contact him. Also, the wife’s signature is required, so if the lender wants a sale before the auction date, then the lender should cooperate with her. The lender will lose much more money if the property goes through the auction process. The sale equity (net amount) gets split 70%-wife, 30%-husband per divorce agreement. If property goes auction, neither one gets any money, because it will likely sell at or about the amount still owed to the lender.
I presume she had the utilities turned back on. I don’t believe the lender or the courts can evict her if she is still a wife and maintaining the property until after the auction sale. Can you contact his divorce attorney, and leave messages or mail if you need to contact husband. If he goes to jail, then you know where he is and and try to contact him on your own, if you need information or signatures.
If you have the time (before the auction date) and experience to process a Short Sale, then you just need her “Authorization to Release Information” concerning the loan. Then you contact the lender and work with them as required. The agreed upon price with the lender may result in being at or very close to the remaining amount owned (because of the large equity). This means there will be very little money left for the 70%/30% split.
It may be best for both her and you to just let her live in the property as long as possible, cost free without paying any rental to anybody. She should start saving any possible rent/house payment money now. She should look now for a place to stay and plan to move into at auction date time.
Do you have any relationship with other REI people in your area? Maybe they have a rental property for her. As a friend and the knowledgeable REI person, you should get into the County Civil Court foreclosure web-site and read all the documents on it pertaining to this case. That way you know what the lender’s attorney is doing and the current status of this case. Thanks to you for being a good friend to her and bringing this need for help to our attention. :-\
Due diligence and good luck to both of you and her children. Longshot
Thanks for the insight Longshot. Sometimes you can lead a horse to water but you can’t make them drink. Husband signed papers to sell when he thought there was a chance for resonciliation with wife, so she already got papers signed. she is counting on the equity from house to move out of state. At this point, she is still in denial. She can’t work or won’t work because of her addictions, and small kids ( I know I know) but thinks she can waitress when she moves out of state somewhere.
I know short sales well, but with so much equity, they will sell for amount owed, so I could work that out with her, but she wants money and isn’t going to settle for nothing.
I was going to lease option her house, but I had several people tell me not to get involved because it will blow up and I will be to blame, eetc.
I told her I could pay X for the house because of condition (mostly outdated) and she freaked out when I gave her my price, so she has to wait for a retail buyer.
Folks------People -------Forclosure is only a symptom of bigger issues, divorce, spouses hating each other, money problems, addictions, etc. Something that was brought on by something else. It has been a real eye opener for me, ironically that I purchase forclosures,to see someone this close deal with the aftermath of an abusive husband who wants her to suffer.
Im sad and not optimistic for her. It does help me to relate to clients when I meet them, and know that there is always the “real” story in their story to us…
Thanks to everyone who has responded and read this thread.
Wow RELinda, I am so sorry that you have to see your best friend go through this. As a friend it is no doubt frustrating and painful to have a solution right there and for her to seem so unwilling to be helped. If the foreclosure was her only problem it would have been a done deal a while ago. But you are so right in recognizing that this is just one piece of a very complicated puzzle that this poor lady is in right now. Having been on both sides of this (yours and hers) in my lifetime, I can tell you that she is not really thinking right now at all. So charge it to her head and not her heart (my grandma strikes again)!
She does need to do something, and it needs to be soon. In many states, as Longshot mentioned, the lender/courts wouldn’t be able to evict her until after the auction sale. But remember in Lincoln’s land a lender can move for an eviction even before the sale date. There are circumstances that they will be responsible for demonstrating, but as you know-- any given judge, any given day.
On a side note, once she gets past the house situation, and before she moves out of state, if you want some referrals for some other resources that she will need to help her clean up and get back on her feet, PM me and I’ll do a little legwork.
Best of luck to you both.