My neighbors finance company won't talk to us

[Sven D.]

Good afternoon,

I am trying to buy or assume my neighbor's home loan from, what looks like to me, a sketchy finance company. Originally we thought they were just the debt collector but they served him papers for a judicial forclosure claiming he owed them almost double what was remaining on his principal due to back taxes and home insurance payments that I highly doubt they have been paying. My neighbor declared bankruptcy about 4 years ago and thought that the house was no longer his and planned on living in it until the sheriff came to kick him out. I should mention he is a very nice old man who gives up easily, so when he tried sending mortgage payments to 3 different companies and had his checks returned he gave up. I went with him to his lawyers office who helped him with the bankruptcy and he said that my neighbor has until the sheriffs sale to sell the home or move out, implying to me that he could still sell the home.

We tried finding out who serviced the loan and who owned the loan through our county records department and even they said that the chain of custody of the loan was unclear and unfinished, likely due to the fact that the title company, servicer, and mortgage company that owned the loan all went bankrupt within the last 10 years. Now this finance company is proceeding with a judicial foreclosure and have sent letters stating their intent and have even left a name on the bottom of the letter with no phone number or email. I have also tried calling the lawyer that's representing the finance company from out of state and left a voicemail saying I want to reach somebody with authority with the finance company they are representing so I could buy the home, but I received no reply. When I call the finance company I get their main call center who sometimes cannot even find my neighbors property in their system, other times they can. I tell them I want to purchase the home at my neighbors address and they tell me I need to go through their REO department who 'have no phone number' and must be contacted by email. I have emailed multiple times with no reply, and have called the call center multiple times asking to be forwarded to their REO department with no luck. I'm trying to reach an account manager to negotiate a sale price, what they're claiming is owed is more than the market value of the house.

I should also mention that my neighbors lawyer seems to think that he is no longer eligible for our state's foreclosure avoidance program because they never went and got help years ago when the finance company would have sent them letters for it. I won't make excuses for my neighbor, he just tells me he thought it was no longer his home to  save after the bankruptcy anyway.

Can anyone think of anything else I could do? Long story short, my neighbor wanted me to assume his loan at 180k but would also be wiling to sell me the house if I could get the finance company to agree to a short sale, but they won't talk to us.

Thanks for reading.