It’s no secret that the HAMP program, which was supposed to help banks make mortgage modifications that would allow homeowners to keep their homes, is a failure. Far from using the HAMP program to modify mortgages, some of the largest mortgage servicers have been using the mortgage modification applications as a marker to fast-track applicants to foreclosure. It’s gotten so bad that Treasury said yesterday it has stopped making payments to the three most frequent offenders, Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase, and Wells Fargo.
Prohibited from borrowing money during the federal government’s slow slide into bankruptcy, Treasury can scarcely afford to keep making payments that the recipients are treating as just another bank bailout anyway. Whole departments could be shut down beginning in September, and long before then, bank bailouts in any form will be out of the question.
