Complaint Review: 21st Mortgage Corp - Knoxville Tennessee

* There's no easy answer, unfortunately, to this question. Your best bet is to make friends with a good attorney. Barring that, I'd hire someone that has a long and credible history of not charging you unless you win. (The more airtight the policy, the better the attorney seems to be - they generally don't take a case unless winning's a near-certainty.)

* Unless you're a rolling 1X30 or under some kind of special treatment (information you've given, however, doesn't indicate you'd be a special case), it's highly unlikely 21st would be calling only 24 hours after the set due date unless there's been a massive overhaul to the AS/400 account database system we used when I worked there. (Seeing as there were relatively few overhauls to this critical program when I worked there, I also find this difficult to believe.)

With the AS/400 system as 21st has it set, delinquent accounts don't dump into a financial counselor's queue until nine days after the account is past due, and when I was there FCs had a very strict and VERY enforced protocol to follow in regard to calling those accounts. (It's a complicated formula, but it was based largely on past payment history, amount due and history of contact, though prescribed solutions often varied widely.)

So, when you say "within 24 hours of the date due", do you mean the ORIGINAL date due on the loan, or a date upon which arrangements to make a payment have been made? Because they'll definitely call weekly and on the day before the date of an arranged payment that's different from what the set due date is supposed to be - company policy. (It's called "confirming arrangements".)

* 21st Mortgage and Vanderbilt both have a firm policy against working with mortgage negotiation firms - largely because the companies in question aren't doing anything the lender themselves cannot do, and also because they'd rather get the money the customer in question is handing to said negotiation firms.

For what it's worth, though, most of those firms are giant ripoffs. Again, mortgage negotiation is something one can do for oneself (in fact, most states require the customer to allow, in writing, the negotiation firm to have access to their account information because of this). It doesn't require some tough-talking failed telemarketer getting paid hundreds (or even thousands) of dollars to fail 9.5 times out of 10 anyway. (And don't even think about getting that money back. It doesn't happen.)

Of course, in your particular case it's doubtful you'll ever get a refinance. The interest rate you got, 11.9 percent, is actually pretty good for 21st and VERY good, if memory serves correctly on the Texas new loans I used to audit.

* It's unknown if your home was ever foreclosed, but if you're reading this I have two questions:

1) Was your deal home-only (read: all you did was finance the home itself; the purchase of land nor the posting of parcels as collateral for the loan did not happen), or land-home (read: land was purchased or posted as collateral as part of the loan)?

If home-only, it's possible foreclosure could happen in as little as "two weeks", but still unlikely. What notices did you receive from 21st? All I see is the mention of a letter from an attorney in a place called Frisco. At least two different notices have to go out first before replevin action can even be considered in Texas.

If land-home, there's no possible way that the home could be sold in "two weeks" unless several months of foreclosure action has taken place first and you lost. Since there's zero mention of this, I believe it is safe to assume this is not the case.

2) When you filed for bankruptcy, did you file Chapter 13 (reorganization) or Chapter 7 (liquidation and write-off)? The most likely answer is 7, so if that's the case - did you elect to SURRENDER the home, REAFFIRM the debt (requires signing of a reaffirmation agreement), or PAY AND RETAIN (basically, you keep paying on the note but the past-due debt on the note, for the most part, is processed and written off during the BK)?

If you elected to SURRENDER, then that could be what your problem was.

Did things work out for you. I feel for you and am wanting to know if anybody helped you.

It is the policy of 21st mortgage to only address customer complaints in a confidential discussion with our customer. To appropriately respond to a complaint may require releasing confidential information, which is strictly forbidden under federal privacy regulations. We will attempt to contact the referenced customer to resolve this complaint.