Average $125,562 Awarded to Military Personal for Improper Foreclosure

This is a brief from an article in the Seattle Times by Associated Press writers  Derek Kravitz and Pete Yost .

Two mortgage Lenders will pay more that $22 million to settle civil charges that they improperly foreclosed on 178 members of the military, some of whom were serving in Iraq or in Afghanistan.

The Justice Department said, that between 2006-2009 Bank of America and Morgan Stanley  failed to get court orders before foreclosing on military personnel in 22 states. The Justice Department awarded to these men and women an average of $125,562.

Some of the members foreclosed on were wounded or had post-traumatic stress disorder.

Under the agreement the lenders agreed to create additional mortgage loan protections for military personnel.

The law the lenders were accused of breaking was the Serivcemembers Civil Relief Act. This act provides that military personnel can’t be evicted or creditors can’t seize their property while they are on Active Duty.

Lenders

Bank of America, BAC Home Loans Servicing formerly Countrywide Home Servicing

Morgan Stanley subsidiary, Saxon Mortgage Services

An other earlier case that has been settled settled:

2005 JPMorgan acknowledged that it had overcharged about 4,000 service members and wrongfully foreclosed on 14 of them. JPMorgan had paid out $2 million to service members and reversed some of the foreclosures.

Feds say they are working to provide better protection for military families and have launched a new agency called Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.

Servicemembers Civil Relief Act

To get a copy of the Servicemembers Civil Relief Act I’m providing you a link to it, it’s in a PDF that will load in  a separate browser window and take about one minute to load. Click here to open and upload.

Get to know your rights especially when you are active military.

This is a brief from an article in the Seattle Times by Associated Press writers  Derek Kravitz and Pete Yost .

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