Hello Tina,You're likely receiving refinance solicitation letters, but without seeing them, I can't say for certain who is sending them. You always have the choice to explore a refinance or simply discard any solicitations you receive.Regarding servicing fees, any lender or loan servicer can only charge the fees that were disclosed when you originally closed on your loan. You have the right to request a full accounting of your loan and dispute any questionable charges. If your servicer claims to have made tax payments that you also paid out of pocket, you can contest those charges by providing copies of canceled checks or other documentation as proof.Lenders are not allowed to impose illegitimate fees. If they refuse to reverse improper charges, you have several options:

Consult with an attorney to protect your rights.
File a complaint with your state's Attorney General.
Report the issue to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB).
Contact the Federal Trade Commission (FTC).
File a complaint with HUD (contact information for each can be found online).

As a borrower, you have rights, and I recommend starting by requesting a full accounting from your loan servicer. If their response is unsatisfactory, you may need to escalate the matter, potentially seeking legal representation if necessary.

Loans are assets for lenders, and the servicing could have been sold to any other lenders over the years. Your in-laws should receive a monthly statement that tells them all the pertinent information about that loan, including who their lender is. If it is one of the older Financial Freedom loans, I would have to believe that the loan was already assigned to HUD, which would narrow the possible servicers down to just two. It could be NOVAD if they were already servicing it before HUD moved their servicing to a new provider, or it could be Compu-Link. You can find information on how to contact the HUD servicers on HUD's website at https://www.hud.gov/program_offices/housing/sfh/nsc/fmaddr You will find your individual HUD Case Number on the front of the Mortgage or Deed of Trust that is a recorded document if you do not still have all of your loan package with the numbers available.

Hello Patricia, I think you may be confusing some of the functions of the reverse mortgage and the steps your brother needs to take if your parents are no longer living in the property (due to death or in the case that they were forced to move to a care facility, etc.). Your mom and dad or their estate always own the home. There is no "buy back" of the home needed because the Financial Freedom or whoever holds the loan now does not own the home, your parents or their estate do/does. Any documents your brother signed were probably as the alternate contact or possibly for something else but he is not obligated on the loan and the loan has no buy-back provision since the lender has no ownership and nothing to sell. Your parents may have sent the lender something so that he would be able to communicate with the lender on their behalf which is an authorization required for any lender to give any third-party information about a loan on which they are not a party to he transaction but I am only guessing. However, if your parents no longer live in the home as their primary residence, that loan is now due and payable under the terms of the loan and if the lender has not called the loan for repayment, it is only a matter of time before they will. The signed paper with the lender may be an authorization that allows him to communicate and work with the lender to send in the repayment of the loan and that could be what he is confusing with buying the property. This would allow the lender to send him a Beneficiary's Demand for repayment of the loan to pay the outstanding balance of the loan. Your family may still need to work on any issues needed to change the title of the property if it is still in mom and dad's name (especially if you need to procure a refinance loan to repay the reverse mortgage). For that I would suggest that you contact your family attorney, especially if mom and dad had a will or trust. If mom and dad have passed, then you may need to work on any issues through a probate. If mom and/or dad are still alive and competent (just out of the home), one or both can still sign authorizations, Deeds, etc. so I would encourage you to contact your attorney as soon as possible before the lender notifies you that they expecting you to tell them what your plans are to repay the loan. It is much easier to take care of things when you are proactive and operating on your timeframes and before the lender is pressing and filing notices than after a foreclosure has begun and your time is limited.

Hello Jacqueline, I am sorry for the predicament your aunt is in but I really can't comment with any degree of specificity because I have no idea why the servicer is requesting money at this time. I also do not understand your threats as you state that you are writing to All Reverse Mortgage, Inc., a company that has and never has had any affiliation with Financial Freedom whatsoever. In fact, to my knowledge, no one in this company has ever worked for Financial Freedom, but for certain I can attest that the ownership of All Reverse Mortgage, Inc., the company that brings ARLO (the All Reverse Loan Optimizer) to the internet to answer industry questions such as this whenever possible, has never worked for, or owned any portion of, Financial Freedom. Therefore, your anger and threats are misplaced. Now let us talk about your aunt's situation. Celink is a servicer for a lender. Your aunt should have received the notice that stated who actually owned her loan but Celink is their servicing agent. They also must inform her of any reasons why they would require her to make a payment since the loan requires no payment for as long as the owner lives in the home and pays all payments of taxes and insurance in a timely manner. Lenders do advance funds on behalf of borrowers at times when the borrower has missed payments of taxes and or insurance and then they can require that the borrower repay any funds advanced. Has your aunt missed paying her taxes and insurance? The one thing I would guess off the top of my head is that she did not pay taxes and/or insurance as they became due and the lender was forced to advance funds to pay these expenses on her behalf and now, they are looking to be repaid for the money they advanced. Do I know that to be certain? No, I do not but that is my best guess without any knowledge of the facts. My advice to you is to do a little research and to possibly get on the phone or help your aunt write a letter before taking the time for threats and complaints that may not help your aunt. There may be a valid reason for everything, and it would certainly be much more beneficial to find out what is causing the issue and then addressing the correct people before wasting time threatening the wrong people. If your aunt did miss payments of taxes and insurance that the lender advanced on her behalf, they are within the law and the contract she signed to now request those funds be repaid. I would strongly suggest that you help your aunt by finding out why the lender is requesting the funds, determine if the request is legitimate (if they say she owes taxes, but she has cancelled checks, there may be an error you can correct there as well), and then take whatever actions are necessary. If your aunt has had some issues, perhaps you can work out a more acceptable solution with the lender through Celink and if she did not miss the payment of taxes or whatever the situation where they feel she owes funds is not accurate, then perhaps you can work toward resolving that issue. There is still plenty of time if this doesn't work to file complaints with whomever you feel would work best including the Federal Trade Commission and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau as the job of both of these government agencies is to protect consumers. You can also file a complaint directly with HUD. You may feel that you need legal representation and that is always a good idea, especially if it gets to a point where there is a possible foreclosure looming. What you ultimately do is completely up to you. Just remember though that the last thing you want to do is wait until it is too late to resolve the issue (after a foreclosure has become final). My best advice is to contact Celink and discuss this with them until you are certain you understand the situation (even if you do not agree) so you will have an idea of what you need to do next and in what timeframe. You will need your aunt to write a letter to Celink authorizing them to speak with you on all matters relating to the loan or they will not be able to talk to you about her loan (or any other third party due to financial privacy laws). If after you have spoken to them you still do not understand or agree with their position, you will at least know what they are contending and why and will know what steps you need to take next. I wish you the best.

Hello Kayla,That's why your father paid mortgage insurance. The loan is non-recourse meaning the only security the lender has is the property. They cannot seek repayment from any other assets if the home is not sufficient to repay the debt.

Hello Bruce, Unless you have permission from your aunt to talk to Financial Freedom on her behalf or now have title to the property, they would not be your first step. The lender can only talk to the borrower, someone authorized by the borrower to speak to them on their behalf or the legal owner of the property. Lenders do not want to take the chance of being sued by borrowers or heirs by making the mistake of breaking financial privacy laws, especially if they give the wrong information to the wrong people. I would recommend that if you have access to your aunt's property, you try to find her latest reverse mortgage statement to determine if there is any equity left in the home. If you can access the home, check her desk for the most recent statement or wait for the next statement to come at the end of this month and compare the amount owed to the value of the home. If there is no equity in the home, you will need to decide if you just want the bank to dispose of the property or if you still want the home anyway. If there is equity or you still want the home you need to realize that the loan is now due and payable but your first contact should probably be a probate attorney who can represent you at the probate court if you believe you are the heir that should receive the property. If the court agrees and awards you the property, then you can contact the lender, inform them that you are now the legal owner and they will work with you to allow you to pay off the loan. Unless you have this legal right, there could be other heirs and the lender will not gamble that you do not have the authorization to act on behalf of the borrower or the estate.

Good Morning Amy,I am sorry, I do not have this information but I might be a little help anyway. Financial Freedom sold to CIT who in turn sold the servicing as well when they exited the reverse mortgage industry. The only article I read said that the sale was conducted to an undisclosed buyer. However, the borrower does receive a monthly statement from the servicer. The borrower, or if the borrower has passed, the heirs selling the property now should be able to give you a copy of the most recent monthly statement which will give you the servicer contact information. From there you should be able to order any demands or statements you need at this point.

Hello Sandra, The contract for the reverse mortgage does not determine who receives the home when your parents pass, your parents do. The reverse mortgage is a loan and the lender does not own the property. The property does not revert to the lender when the last person on title passes, but the loan does become due and payable. Heirs have the option to repay the loan with funds available to them, refinance the loan with new financing or sell the property if they wish or they can simply walk away and owe nothing but then the lender would still have to go through a foreclosure action. The property does not automatically revert to the lender. So you will find no language in any of the paperwork saying which heir will receive the home, that is entirely up to your parents and if they do not settle that in advance, the home will go through probate (and may still have to in many cases).If you have questions about your parents' property and how to ensure that the title is passed to heirs, I would strongly suggest that you contact an attorney to see about setting up a will or trust as he/she advises. If mom still has capacity currently, it is much easier to have her direct her estate now than later when she passes or lacks capacity. About the condo approval, the lender/servicer should have whatever paperwork was included in their file when the loan was originated but I don't understand your point. Condominium project approval is not a "legal requirement". I certainly cannot speculate what may have transpired at that time. HUD has guidelines, recommendations and hard rules. Sometimes HUD will reject the insurance request if the lender violates the requirements, sometimes they will allow the lender to "indemnify" HUD against any losses that HUD might sustain as a result of a deficiency the lender had on a loan, depending on the issue. Even if HUD does require documentation for the project and the lender did not obtain it, HUD may have allowed the lender to indemnify HUD against any losses as a result, but I have no way of knowing that. Also remember, the lender made the loan to your mom. HUD is not a lender and did not close the loan. HUD agreed to insure the loan. The lender agreed to make the loan under certain terms, and they did so. Therefore, I am not sure what you hope to achieve by getting the HUD condo questionnaire currently. If the lender still has it and they accepted the answers and made the loan, I don't know what you hope to gain by questioning whether or not they followed HUD guidelines 13 years later (because the lender accepted the answers, made the underwriting decision and HUD obviously insured the loan). Perhaps you should also discuss your strategy with the attorney you plan to use to secure the title and heirship to see if you may be hitting this wall needlessly?

Hello Donna, You really need to speak to an attorney to determine the legal liability of the estate about different obligations. There are other things that people also don't consider sometimes when deciding whether to pay for things like insurance, etc. and if someone goes onto the property and is hurt while it is still in your dad's name, there may or may not be liability for the estate, especially since if the insurance expires, the lender will force place coverage that covers the dwelling only and not the contents or medical liability. Therefore, to determine what you want to do from a liability standpoint, you really need legal advice, which we cannot give. About the Deed in Lieu of Foreclosure, if the lender accepts the Deed, they accept ownership to the property. Again, you need to talk to an attorney to determine "liability". Neither of you signed anything saying you agreed to pay anything. The estate may still have some liability until you sell the property or the lender owns the home, but I could not begin to tell you what, if any, that liability would be but I don't know if you are referring to personal liability or if you are asking about any liability the estate may still have until the home is sold or Deeded back to the lender. That again would be a question for an attorney.