After losing his job in January, Stuart Miller has fought hard to keep his home out of foreclosure.
At the end of May, the 55-year-old Plano man began trying to get Wells Fargo & Co. to review his application for a loan modification.
After making repeated calls, he finally was told that the company would place a three-month moratorium on his mortgage payments.
“They’re going to give me July, August and September, but I haven’t paid June yet,” said Miller, a former trainer for a franchise company.
He’s among many struggling homeowners who say their attempts to get a loan modification have been met with either long waits to get their case reviewed, no response at all or a runaround.
The Obama administration is leaning on mortgage servicers – the companies that collect and process mortgage payments – to step up modifications.
A report released last week by the Treasury Department showed wide variations in how quickly mortgage companies are helping troubled homeowners avoid foreclosures.
It also found the government’s program is helping only a tiny fraction of struggling homeowners. As of July, only 9 percent of eligible borrowers had seen their mortgage payments reduced with modified loans, the report said.
