Complaint Review: Challenge Mortgage

In April of 2004, my husband and I decided to buy a house that would be accessible for our handicapped son, and we went to Challenge Mortgage, in Toledo, Ohio, for a pre-approval. Our loan broker was Stephanie. She told us that with his income, we could be approved for $115,000. We did not find a house until June 2004.

When we found the house, we called Stephanie back, told her about the house, and the price. She said she would run another pre-approval and send the letter to the realtor. The realtor told us she got a pre-approval letter and said we could bid on the home. We made the bid, it was accepted on June 18. In the purchase agreement it was written that closing would be on or before July 20. Again, we called Stephanie and told her of the closing date and asked if we could get a loan in that amount of time. She said yes we could and we went from that.

Stephanie told us that she would overestimate our interest rate at 7.99% to give us an idea of our payments, so we could see if we could afford the monthly mortgage. Three weeks until the closing date she still had not found a loan, when we would call to ask her if we had been approved, she would tell us that she was working on a loan, yes the interest would be low, and she would call us with more details. She would never return calls, or call us with more details. With two weeks to go until closing, she called to tell us we could get one of the loans she looked at. The loan was at 9.3% interest. It was way off her original overestimate. We said no, those terms were not acceptable, we needed to keep our payments below $800 a month. She said she would look into 2 other loan possibilities. We never heard what happened to those.

With a week and a half until closing, we again called. Stephanie told us that my husbands credit scores weren't good and asked if she could pull my credit. I said ok, I don't have a job, so it didn't matter to me if she looked at my credit, it was useless anyway. After looking at my scores, she said she would try to get us a joint loan. That never happened. Then she said she would get a loan in just my name.

She asked if there was anything I did to earn a few bucks. I said I do sewing for people, it's a small business that is just starting but I make under $600 a year, so I do not have tax forms. Stephanie said that was fine, she needed copies of my bank statements with my total deposits for each month on them. She then applied for a loan for us using my credit scores and saying that half of the bank deposits for the month were my earnings. I asked her if it was illegal, because to me it sounded like lying on the application. She said it was legal, that it was ok if we said half that income was mine.

That financing company said they would give us a loan. She called me on the 14th of July and asked if I could come down to the office to sign the loan papers. When I asked about the loan terms, she said it was a 100% financing loan at 7.5% interest. She asked again if I could come down before she left that day. I couldn't make it down there, she said she would bring the papers by my house the next morning. The next morning she never showed up. In the afternoon she called, told me that my payments would be $10 higher than we thought. When I asked why, she told me that the loan was an 80/20 loan, the 80% of the loan was at 7.75%, the 20% of the loan was at 12%.

This was not what she told me the day before, and she had wanted me to sign these papers the day before. I told her no, again it made our payments over $800 a month and that was not acceptable. She said well how much are you buying this house for? Now, I had told her when the bid was accepted how much it was, I had to get it approved by her before signing the bid. She had talked to the realtor too, who told her how much the purchase price was. When I said why don't you know the loan amount, she said she never received the copy of the purchase agreement. Once I hung up with her, I called the realtor, and had her fax over the purchase agreement again.

Stephanie had said that she would look into an FHA loan for us. When she suggested this, it was 3 days before closing. I called her on Saturday about the loan, she said she was stopping in at the office and would call me to let me know if she had received a fax about our application. She never called on Saturday, Sunday, or Monday. I had to call her on Monday, 1 day before closing, and ask her what was going on. She told me the terms of the loan, then told me, as she did on Friday, that we had gotten the closing date moved back. I told her we didn't, I hadn't agreed to anything like that, the sellers had already said they would not move the closing date, and the realtor knew nothing about it. Stephanie told me that the person she talked to at Danberry realty had told her they were faxing an addendum for the closing date. Our realtor for the house was Remax. When I told her that, she said oh yeah I see that now. She argued with me for 5 minutes saying she had the addendum there saying the date had been moved. I asked her who she talked to, she told me the name of the person. That person was just an assistant who faxed over a copy of the purchase agreement. I had my copies of the agreement in front of me, and told Stephanie what she was looking at was not an extension, but was the actual purchase agreement. Stephanie said oh, ok I didn't read it, I just thought it was an extension. Even on Monday, she was still trying to get us an FHA loan that she knew she could not get in 1 day's time.

Even with the FHA loan, she did not know the terms. When I would ask, she would give me different reasons why she couldn't give me a rate. I looked on line for FHA loans, and I was able to get a reasonable rate estimate in 2 minutes, she couldn't give us one in a week.

During this time period of working on getting the loan, challenge mortgage moved their offices from Byrne rd. to somewhere in downtown Toledo. They had their phone number changed, and I heard several times that I couldn't get a hold of them because the phones just aren't hooked up. I had to track down their new number, and even when I did get that, it was to another company, an insurance company called Katina Duran Insurance. This company is linked to the mortgage company according to Stephanie. She told me in one of our conversations that Katina Duran Insurance was a part of Challenge Mortgage. Stephanie gave me another phone number and said that was their permanent phone number. Now when I call that, it's a fax machine. With no address and a working phone only every so often, its almost impossible to get a hold of them at all.

Because of her taking her time, we are at closing day, and with no loan, and no house. The whole point of us moving was because my son is in a wheelchair and needs a more accessible home to maneuver in. I can understand if we couldn't get a loan, or even if we couldn't get rates within our range, but she strung us along, telling us oh yeah I have a loan that will work great. Her great working loan never happened. My main complaint here is that she never came through with what she promised, and waited till last minute to tell us that. She didn't even know the closing date, which she was told several times. She never read the purchase agreement that was faxed to her, which she asked for. She was going to exaggerate my earnings.

the brokers do not return calls, do not produce what they promise, and have no idea what they are doing. I have never gotten a mortgage before, and I knew more about some of the loans than the broker did. Being reasonable about it, I would not have had a complaint had she said from the beginning that she did not know if we could get a loan, or that she did not know details of the purchase agreement. She didn't even base her numbers on anything near realistic. It seems to my husband and me that she had no idea what she was doing, and was just talking to make it look like she had a clue.

Joei
toledo, Ohio
U.S.A.