Small Mistakes Can Lead To Foreclosure
By: Gerri L. Elder
Denroy Bell was trying to enjoy a vacation abroad when he got a startling call from his neighbor. Bell was in England while a bank moved in on his Florida home and began the foreclosure process.
The home in Kissimmee, Florida sits in the middle of a foreclosure epidemic. Every day homes are lost to foreclosure and Central Florida has been especially hard hit with foreclosures.
Bell's neighbor made the international call to let him know that the locks were being changed on his home and his pool had been drained. The neighbor watched as a troop of people came to the home and began to take it back for Citi-Residental bank.
WFTV News reports that Bell actually lives in London most of the year and rents out his Florida home while he lives abroad.
There's no evidence that Bell ever missed or was late on a mortgage payment. The fact of the matter is, he does not even have a mortgage loan with Citi-Residential. The bank made a mistake. In the midst of their foreclosure frenzy, they actually foreclosed on the wrong home and it happened to be the home of someone who doesn't owe them a dime.
In his or her haste to start the foreclosure process on yet another home, someone at the bank made a huge mistake. In all likelihood it was an honest mistake. With the mountains of foreclosure paperwork that banks deal with on a constant basis now, things don't always go perfectly.
Certainly banks are not the only ones that make mistakes that can lead to mortgage foreclosure. Recently it was widely reported that Aretha Franklin was facing foreclosure on her mansion in Detroit. Franklin says that due to a mistake by her lawyer, $445 in taxes was not paid on her property in 2005. The property was in danger of foreclosure because with interest in penalties Franklin now owes $19,192 in back taxes.
A foreclosure judgment in the amount of $445 was filed against the $700,000 mansion. Franklin says that she will pay up before March 31 to reclaim her property so that she will not lose the home to foreclosure. The Associated Press reports that Franklin also owes back taxes totaling $18,746 on the property from 2006 and 2007 but that the foreclosure proceedings on those tax debts would not begin until next year.
So whether it is a bank mistake or an innocent mistake by a homeowner, small errors can lead to big trouble and foreclosure.
Aretha Franklin was likely shocked when she found out that by not paying a $445 tax bill she was in danger of losing her home. Now she must pay an enormous amount of interest and penalties just to get her home out of foreclosure.
Denroy Bell was probably equally shocked, if not even more so, to learn that a bank that he does not even have a mortgage with foreclosed on his home while he was out of the country. Bell seems to be taking the matter in stride though and says he just wants the bank to clean the pool and change the locks back. Of course we all hope they are more careful to avoid these kinds of mistakes in the future.