NACA Save the Dream Mortgage Help Tour
Mother Jones reporter Andy Kroll has gotten down and personal with desperate homeowners. In the illusion of recovery Kroll witnesses people showing up for free help from a group I've never heard of, the NACA.
Currently the NACA is touring the country with free help for distressed homeowners in the Save the Dream program. Current Pit stop is Charlotte, NC. Here is Kroll's account from the NACA mortgage help tour at San Francisco's Cow Palace:
A ragged line of them wound through the lot outside the entrance to the Cow Palace, a dingy arena decades past its prime on the southern edge of San Francisco. These people, and thousands more like them who had streamed into the arena all day long from as far away as Los Angeles, Phoenix, and Las Vegas, were unemployed, broke, bankrupt, or at their wit’s end. They were here waiting for help -- for their chance to make it inside the warm arena to participate in “America’s Best Mortgage Program.”
For these homeowners, the last shot at saving their homes -- and their personal version of the American Dream -- lay under the glow of the floodlights in a expanse where tiers of brown and yellow seats encircled a desk-lined floor more accustomed to livestock shows and rodeos. This was, in fact, the latest stop on the “Save the Dream” tour, a massive homeowner-relief event organized by a consumer advocate group, the Neighborhood Assistance Corporation of America (NACA).
The turnout was staggering: close to 45,000 desperate homeowners showed up during NACA's five-day stand at the Cow Palace for the chance to renegotiate their disastrous subprime mortgages or sky-high interest rates or interest-only payments. For them, this event beat any chance at a star-studded concert -- and best of all, it was free.
Inside, homeowners received housing-related financial advice and met with NACA’s counselors, a stoic crew, always with coffee or energy drinks in hand and clad in red and yellow T-shirts with STOP LOAN SHARKS and SHARKS BEWARE emblazoned on their backs. Here, homeowners could have their income, taxes, and spending habits analyzed, and possibly walk away with a monthly mortgage payment that actually fit their situations. With that payment figure in hand, homeowners could then meet with representatives from their mortgage companies in the same arena and try to hammer out new terms on more affordable mortgages.
The process would save many of them thousands of dollars, defuse an explosive mortgage, even avert foreclosure. To boost morale, NACA officials occasionally ushered chosen homeowners to a makeshift lectern where each offered a glowing testimonial over a PA system to the work taking place. They spoke fervently of new fixed-interest loans and fought back tears, while thanking their counselors, friends, NACA, and -- regularly -- God.
Here is some video of these events.
Since we're non-partisan and I am always highly suspect of political agenda groups, I thought I'd link to this corporate conservative article on NACA. For myself, there is one thing I agree with from conservatives, to buy a home one must have a stable income to afford a home. This is why you see the jobs, jobs, jobs chant mantra on EP. Considering the conservatives found no real funky dirt on NACA (unlike ACORN), I decided to post this link to the NACA in hope some people find some real help.
Periodically we get anonymous comments from the desperate, asking us to help save their home from foreclosure. Unfortunately we're an economics blog and just don't have that kind of power beyond screaming our heads off on what is going on in America.
I note today's anonymous comment from a desperate homeowner:
citi bank and the scam on modifing my home loan
Submitted by janet shidler (not verified) on Mon, 11/30/2009 - 07:52.citi bank offered me a home modification in may of 2009 in nov.2009 after 4 peyments they called to tell me i was not qualified. i made all payments on time and now they will not return my calls. i contacted sigtarp and greenpath. citi did not return those calls either. i have 2000,000in this home and need someone to help me talk to citi. thank you. i had a fixed 6% rate and used all my retirerment money.
Folks, you might try this if you're desperate. Check them out, do your homework but financial terrorist tactics against the large banks....who are currently getting into payday loans and charging loan shark interest rates on credit cards? Doesn't sound too extreme to me under the circumstances.
I would like to see a few class action lawsuits against some of these banks. Where are the Pro Bono attorneys, getting out there and fighting for the middle class?
It appears the Obama administration isn't going to do anything against these banks, who are making more money by foreclosing than modifying mortgages. Read HAMP is a SCAM and see if you could do any worse with the NACA. I don't think so.
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Funny. Someone who actually wants to help those less fortunate
is labeled a radical (per the Human Events article). But if you are someone who practically plunders global wealth and resources you are a model capitalist. Fuck the conservatives and fuck their fucked up neo-liberal, trickle down, supply side policies.
People need to do their homework/research regarding any person or entity when it comes to mortgage finances. NACA on its face sounds legit. However, I don't like no down payment loans that they are marketing - just my opinion.
RebelCapitalist.com - Financial Information for the Rest of Us.
no down payment loans
That's what I thought as well. I tried to research this out but no money down loans, if that person's income isn't stable, up to snuff is a recipe for disaster.
I think that's one of the huge complaints from conservative land (legit) that the community reinvestment act forced banks to lend to people who obviously could not make the payments.
My thing is forget that absurdity and focus on jobs, jobs, jobs, jobs, enabling people to hold down a job, job, job, job, training, education to enable people to get and hold down a job, job, job, job....
Anyway, I looked over the conservatives because I never heard of this group and figure they would be the ones digging out the dirt if they could.
That article does note a lot of "to their credit" commentary....but I sure don't want to promote yet another organization who is busy ballooning the overall prices and getting people to buy homes there is no way over 5 years they are going to hang onto them.
I think it should be very amusing with a host of U.S. "middle class" shows up at their doors. Honestly that's another issue, the regular, generic, not "name brand" group called the U.S. middle class are the ones who seriously need help and so often these sorts of things only target the uber-poor.
Also, I personally try to differentiate between the corporate propaganda conservative vs. the real conservatives vs. the Ron Paul Luddite libertarian conservatives between the anti-choice, women as property conservatives. Too many conflicts of issue there to lump 'em as one bunch.
Why I grabbed the title "Populist" because "Progressive" had become so damn exploited and abused. I've seen corporations label themselves as "Progressive", special interest groups are magically "Progressive"...hell, we even have a 24/7 advertising car insurance company that claims to be "Progressive". ;)
I disagree. CRA doesn't force anything.
Blaming CRA is just a smoke screen for how the mortgage industry fucked up. Majority of these subprime loans were not related to CRA eligibly lenders.
And besides CRA specifically says that banks should not abandon sound lending practices. Again fuck them!
RebelCapitalist.com - Financial Information for the Rest of Us.
reserve judgment
and the reason is I have not seen a solid, objective analysis on who exactly got what from where in terms of mortgages. I see the foreclosure maps and I've seen the posts "correlating" somethings to those locations and it sure looks suspicious.
But yeah, bottom line the MBS backed CDOs, i.e. derivatives are the real problem and it doesn't matter if every single illegal immigrant making $9/hr cash under the table buying a $500k home got one.
But ya know I like those spreadsheets and I just cannot see objective data analysis on this whole "CRE" thing to say...
I was more pointing out some of their claims...
Here is something
Subprime Lending and The Community Reinvestment Act [pdf file]
RebelCapitalist.com - Financial Information for the Rest of Us.
Hey I've seen this
but I've seen others as well.
I think unfortunately the point of this post has veered way off.
The point is we have desperate people writing anonymous comments on our site saying "please help me" and maybe this program can get them their refinancing while the major banks screw and jerk 'em around, forcing them into bankruptcy to lose everything because it's more profitable.
So, it's not all of these past programs I want to debate, more maybe this is an option for all of the people getting the run around in the maze of useless "for show only" programs that's happening.
Agreed and as I've written on this thread
people should definitely do their homework when it comes to dealing with entities like NACA. It helps that they are a HUD approved housing counselor. They say they are non-profit but even with that there are scam non-profits.
Other sources to check for legitimacy is with state attorney general offices or state consumer protection divisions. Better Business Bureau is another place to check.
A little secret: some law schools offer legal clinics - particularly housing law clinics and the legal services are often provided at a discount or free. Here is an example: Cleveland-Marshall Law School. There are also public-interest law firms that specialize in housing law.
This is a matter of losing shelter so people should be very aggressive because it is a matter of survival.
Having said that: I offered the above reference because I am sick and tired of the bullshit that conservatives and "free market" fundamentalists keep using to blame entities and programs such as ACORN and CRA for the mortgage crisis. Bottomline: the cause of the mortgage crisis was old fashion GREED with a lot of FRAUD mixed in and a touch of ILLITERACY.
RebelCapitalist.com - Financial Information for the Rest of Us.
NACA may be OK but again people should do their homework.
Again, these neo-liberal macroeconomic policies are to blame for this crisis. The lack of job growth and constant downward pressure on wages - the abandonment of full employment policies had to be replaced with something or else there would be a lot of pissed off people. So we get:
+ Asset price inflation
+ Cheap imports from national super retail chains
+ More household debt
It gave the impression or appearance of prosperity and growth but it wasn't REAL.
I agree its all about JOBS, JOBS, JOBS and reestablishing the link between wage growth and productivity growth.
RebelCapitalist.com - Financial Information for the Rest of Us.
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