What does having an “underwater mortgage” mean anyway?
Simply put, it’s a situation in which you owe more than your house is worth when you consider all of the current mortgages on your property. With the decline in property values over the past several years, millions, yes millions, of people have found themselves in this situation through no fault of their own. Couple that with other detrimental economic factors like high unemployment, high medical costs, etc. and many people are finding that they not only have an underwater mortgage, but they can no longer make the payment, and many of these folks we help by negotiating a short sale with their lender.
But what if you have an underwater mortgage and you don’t want to do a short sale or loan modification, you want to know how to SAVE your house?
The usual place to look for the answer is to ask friends and family what they know about how to resolve an underwater mortgage, but the problem is, they likely have one too. Many real estate resources, and I would bet that MOST real estate resources like Realtors and attorneys, will suggest the 3 most common solutions:
1) Wait it out. If you have the means, keep paying your mortgage so you don’t damage your credit and wait for the market to turn around.
2) Strategic default. Purposely stop paying your mortgage and move, either renting another house, or if you have great credit and high income, buy another house BEFORE the late payments for your current house show up on your credit report…. letting it go to foreclosure.
3) Do a short sale. Request that your lender let you sell your house for less than what you owe.
Now the problem with the last 2 suggestions is that neither one addresses the question, “How to SAVE your house”, they merely are ideas presented as options to prevent you from having to keep paying your underwater mortgage. Additionally, many would agree that option #2 (strategic default) is an immoral solution even though the “economics” of that decision make sense. And option #3 would require some credit damage to take place because most lenders won’t even consider a short sale unless payments are missed, AND it means you have to SELL – again, not addressing how to SAVE your house.
Fortunately, now there IS a way to address your underwater mortgage and help you save your house.
For the last 6 months or so of 2011, we’ve been working on this strategy and testing it. It works. It’s legal. And homeowners are SHOCKED that this strategy is out there….albeit in VERY limited supply. In fact, VERY few companies even know this strategy exists and if they ARE aware of it, they don’t know how to do it.
This process takes specific resources and experience, in fact, your lenders won’t work with you as the homeowner directly to complete this process. When successful, which is MOST of the time, your credit is preserved (you don’t stop making payments to your lender), your debt is GREATLY reduced, AND you get to KEEP your house!
Before I go on, let me be completely clear about what this strategy is NOT…
This strategy is NOT a loan modification.
This strategy is NOT a short sale.
This strategy is NOT a traditional re-finance (you can’t get a new loan on a property with an underwater mortgage).
This is the ONLY strategy that will help you:
* Save Your House
* Preserve Your Credit
* Reduce Your Mortgage (your overall mortgage balance, NOT just your payment)
Since this is a unique strategy, it requires a unique homeowner….it doesn’t work for everyone in every underwater mortgage situation. I’ve put together a webpage that explains what characteristics must be in place for you to qualify for this very specific kind of help. Once on the page, you’ll also have the opportunity to receive a FREE video that goes into even more detail about the process and uses an actual example of how this works. Go to Underwater Mortgage, How to Save Your House to see if you qualify.
Millions of people around the country have an underwater mortgage and many of them are writing that check every month and cringing, knowing it will be YEARS before they have equity in their property again, and wondering in their mind if there’s a way out of this mess that doesn’t involve SELLING their house. Now there is.
Go to Underwater Mortgage, How to Save Your House and learn more.
If you have comments or questions, I’d be glad to engage them below.
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