Complaint Review: Fairbanks Capital

Until now, I never realized what a problem Fairbanks Capital Corp. was for others. I am SOOO glad I found this site! I actually have had two very negative situations with them regarding rental properties financed through them.

We are in Wisconsin, and properties are in Wisconsin, but Fairbanks address to send payment that we have is for Arizona.

My mother passed away in October of 2001. I was named the executor of her estate. My mother, husband, and myself were supposed to be listed as "joint tenants" on a rental property that we refinanced through them. The interest rate was around 11% at the time.

Around November or December of 2002, we received 2 bills from Fairbanks in the mail... still addressed with my mother's name on them.

One was for the mortgage of our rental property. The other was for some other outrageous amount for a property that we had never heard of, with an interest rate of 13.95%. I contacted them & told them that she had no such mortgage, and to immediately remove her name from the other property, or that we would file fraud charges against them. I also told them to write back to me & send me proof that they had indeed taken her name off of the mortgage. I never heard back from them again.

Instead, mysteriously, the interest rate that we had on the rental property jumped up to 13.95%.

All attempts to contact them have been a fruitless waste of time & completely unproductive. They claimed numerous times to have their computers down. They claimed that I needed to call different numbers & press different buttons. Finally, I left a message with someone in their tax department, hoping to get the issue resolved... I was later told the only way to resolve it was to refinance the property -- which I am now trying to do by looking around for the best deal on rates.

After a hard year with no renters in the place, and a trashed house left by previous renter which we had to completely remodel, we made a couple of payments at the end of the month, instead of the beginning... now they have sent us a bill stating that we owe them $1400 some odd dollars, ( mortgage payment is roughly $465 on the property), when asked about this, again after numerous phone calls, lies, and run around from them, we were told that it was "probably" due to escrow payments we owed... when asked about this, the person stated that they had paid taxes for us, but had not sent us a bill or receipt...

Anyhow, they were also instrumental in doing another snow job on us shortly after my mother died with another rental property she had re-financed through them.

They claimed that they hadn't received payments on it... while, she was in the hospital dying, the previous mortgage company had sold the loan to Fairbanks, and they NEVER sent notification to her... we kept sending payments to the first mortgage company. A month or two later, after one of the renters gave us letters that they had been receiving about the property, we contacted them, and sent them copies of certified bank checks sent to the other mortgage company. We then sent in a regular payment for that month. My mother had died two weeks previously to sending this payment, but I was anticipating that the house would be under my care, as I had been the manager, was to be named the executor, and was willed the house by my mother in her will...(she had signed a title transfer 2 years prior but attorney never filed it... same attorney for estate -- since has been fired, but what can I do now? No one around here will sue him for malpractice), They returned the payment, and refused it. When I spoke with estate attorney about this, he said not to worry, and to wait because they couldn't foreclose yet... In December, the renter called me early in the morning saying a sheriff had served her papers. She was concerned & came up to our house. We called the attorney from there, and once again, he told us not to worry, that he would take care of it and that we had plenty of time. He told me that leagally, at that time not yet being appointed PR, I couldn't do anything or even contact the mortgage company myself, or send any other payments in to them, or receipts of paid checks, or anything regarding this.

In January, I was appointed by the court PR for the estate. Before the end of the month, before the attorney had done anything, Fairbanks requested & received a summary judgment for foreclosure. The renter served 14 days notice & had moved out due to the stress of being served & being hassled by Fairbanks before the end of December.

The attorney assured me we still had time to sell the property before it was auctioned off. He still did nothing. Later, he stated that he felt that there wasn't enough equity in the property to worry about.

This was a 3br 2 bath rm lower/2 br 1 bathrm upper that was appraised around $92,000. Mortgage amount roughly $58,000.

So, the property was auctioned off at foreclosure, and completely lost to the estate, and myself.

The only recourse I have had is to fire the attorney. I still had to pay him a $1500 fee for what little work he did do for the estate, and have found no one in this area who is either willing or able to take him or Fairbanks on.

Anyone out there who feels they can help, please feel free to email me, or post a message here. I will check back.

Lois
Eau Claire, Wisconsin
U.S.A.

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