{"id":1272,"date":"2011-10-31T13:32:00","date_gmt":"2011-10-31T19:32:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/?p=1272"},"modified":"2011-11-01T10:13:40","modified_gmt":"2011-11-01T16:13:40","slug":"small-banks-may-be-more-likely-to-sue-former-homeowners","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/2011\/10\/31\/small-banks-may-be-more-likely-to-sue-former-homeowners\/","title":{"rendered":"Small Banks May Be More Likely to Sue Former Homeowners"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_1291\"  class=\"wp-caption module image right\" style=\"max-width: 300px;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/2011\/10\/31\/small-banks-may-be-more-likely-to-sue-former-homeowners\/mortgage-assistance-group-counselors-helps-south-floridian-home-owners\/\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-1291\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-1291\" title=\"Mortgage Assistance Group Counselors Helps South Floridian Home Owners\" src=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/files\/2011\/10\/10-31-Bank-of-America-300x200.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"200\" srcset=\"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/files\/2011\/10\/10-31-Bank-of-America-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/files\/2011\/10\/10-31-Bank-of-America-620x413.jpg 620w, https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/files\/2011\/10\/10-31-Bank-of-America-220x146.jpg 220w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><p class=\"wp-media-credit\">Joe Raedle \/ Getty Images<\/p><p class=\"wp-caption-text\">Home owners met with a Bank of America negotiator last summer, in hopes of restructuring a mortgage loan.<\/p><\/div>\n<p>Bank of America is the bank mentioned in <a title=\"In the Wake of Foreclosure, a Debt That Won\u2019t\u00a0Die\" href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/2011\/10\/25\/in-the-wake-of-foreclosure-a-debt-that-wont-die\/\" target=\"_blank\">our recent story<\/a> about lenders suing homeowners for the amount of the mortgage that remains after a foreclosure, but it may be that smaller banks are more likely than large ones to pursue what are called deficiency claims.<\/p>\n<p>Terri Pickens, an attorney with Pickens Law in Boise, has come to that conclusion, based on her experience representing clients who have been served with deficiency judgments.\u00a0 &#8220;The small banks pursue everything,&#8221; she said.\u00a0 &#8220;I have not seen Bank of America pursue them.\u00a0 In my clients\u2019 cases, whether it was a modest house to a multimillion dollar house, they haven\u2019t gone after the deficiency.&#8221;\u00a0 Attorney Brian Webb of Angstman Johnson agrees with Pickens&#8217; analysis.<!--more--> <del><\/del><\/p>\n<p><div class=\"related-content alignleft\"><h4 class=\"related-header\">Related<\/h4><div class=\"links\"><h5>Posts<\/h5><ul><li class=\"link\"><a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/2011\/10\/25\/in-the-wake-of-foreclosure-a-debt-that-wont-die\/\">In the Wake of Foreclosure, a Debt That Won\u2019t\u00a0Die<\/a><\/li><li class=\"link\"><a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/2011\/09\/21\/digging-around-for-the-roots-of-idahos-foreclosure-rate\/\">Digging Around for the Roots of Idaho\u2019s Foreclosure Rate<\/a><\/li><\/ul><\/div><div class=\"topics\"><h5>Topics<\/h5><p class=\"topic\"><img class=\"alignleft\" src=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/files\/2011\/08\/PhillipSpears_Getty-60x60.jpg\" height=\"60\" width=\"60\" \/><a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/topic\/housing-market\/\">Your Guide to Idaho\u2019s Housing Market<\/a><\/p><\/div><\/div>As for the banks, large and small, they prefer to say little on the subject.\u00a0 I called and e-mailed several, asking for information about how they determine when to pursue deficiency claims.\u00a0 A Wells Fargo spokesman issued this brief response: \u201cWhere permitted, we may pursue deficiency judgments on a case-by-case basis.\u201d\u00a0 Bank of America has yet to reply, two weeks after <em>StateImpact Idaho<\/em>&#8216;s initial request and despite significant follow-up.<\/p>\n<p>Spokane-based Sterling Savings Bank was described in interviews with Pickens and another attorney as a bank that has been especially persistent about filing deficiency judgments against homeowners.\u00a0 I called the bank to ask about it.\u00a0 In an e-mailed response, a spokeswoman said only that Sterling Savings does have\u00a0 policies for determining when to pursue former homeowners for deficiencies, but those policies are internal.\u00a0 &#8220;Deficiency judgements are extremely complex and are only pursued as a way to seek repayment for monies rightfully owed to the bank,&#8221; she <del><\/del>wrote.<\/p>\n<p>However, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.oregonlive.com\/business\/index.ssf\/2010\/02\/sterling_savings_bank_posts_lo.html\" target=\"_blank\">this 2010 article<\/a> from <em>The Oregonian<\/em>, featuring an interview with Sterling President and CEO Greg Seibly, sheds a bit of light.\u00a0 According to the article, the bank, which had missed a deadline from federal and state regulators to raise new capital, &#8220;launched an aggressive legal campaign to recover its losses.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>This fits with attorney Terri Pickens&#8217; hypothesis about why some banks are more likely than others to file deficiency claims.\u00a0 &#8220;It&#8217;s basically the banks that need the capital,&#8221; she said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Bank of America is the bank mentioned in our recent story about lenders suing homeowners for the amount of the mortgage that remains after a foreclosure, but it may be that smaller banks are more likely than large ones to pursue what are called deficiency claims. Terri Pickens, an attorney with Pickens Law in Boise, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":46,"featured_media":1291,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[13],"tags":[40],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1272"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/46"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1272"}],"version-history":[{"count":29,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1272\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1349,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1272\/revisions\/1349"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1291"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1272"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1272"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1272"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}