1. Contact your mortgage company. You don't' just contact the normal phone number showing on your statements that come with payment coupons. You can start with that number but tell them you are having financial problems and need to work out the problem. The odds are high your mortgage company is recording the call and just notified them of the problem, making a record that you took proactive steps toward resolution.



2. Ask for Loss Mitigation when talking to your Mortgage Company. They might try to deflect you from the Loss Mitigation and apply a great deal of pressure (they have training in doing this), to bring your loan current, just be persistent, and keep repeating you are requesting the number for the Loss Mitigation Department.

3. Keep detailed records of all phone calls, faxes, email and even collection calls. This is important if you are in litigation situation with the mortgage company. This means every phone call, every telefax, every email, every traceable mail receipt you sent, every piece of paper correspondence they sent.

4. Once you've obtained the magic Loss Mitigation phone number, phone them and ask what steps you need to follow and any forms or application you need to fill out to get a loan modification or approval for a Short Sale (selling the property for an amount that is less than you owe the mortgage company). The forms are key to starting the process going, the mortgage company will not even do anything with your claim till it has the paperwork in hand.

5. Choose your course of action. Do you want a temporary reduction to get over a short term money problem? Or do you need a permanent solution like a Short Sale (see number 4 above defining Short Sale)?

6. Fill out all forms required plus whatever is relevant for your case.

7. Keep originals of all your paperwork. You can almost count on your mortgage company losing the paperwork you send them. In fact they will not only lose it once, it's very probable they will lose your documents, or parts of total document package, multiple times. Do not allow this to frustrate you into giving up on the process. Much of this is going to be a test of persistence and patience. Don't take it personally. In the current market the Loss Mitigation staff is handling unprecedented numbers of requests.

8. Put your name, loan number, and contact information on headers areas (or margins) of every single piece of paper you submit. Again, Loss Mitigation are all but buried under avalanches of paper during this mortgage crisis, and the chances of your document making it back without originals increases dramatically if all this information is on every piece of paper.

9. Use a method of shipment that provides you tracking and a receipt, preferably a receipt that requires an actual signature at the destination, when you send your documents to your mortgage company. This step most likely will do nothing to speed up the process, but it will be vital in protecting you because you have a record you can take to court if you if you are in litigation situation with the mortgage company.

10. Wait for the call. If the Loss Mitigation Department tells you to contact them for an update once a week, make sure you put on your calendar to make that call each week. Expect progress to be slow, they have huge backlog of paper and not enough people to wade through it.

Finally you must understand Lost Mitigation processors are just people and are swamped with paper work, so don't get angry with them. Their department is overloaded and understaffed. Do what they ask and be courteous; otherwise your paperwork just might drop to the bottom of their every increasing piles of paperwork, after you already waited 60 days to be assigned someone to talk to you. Patience with the slowness of the process and have to resubmit documents repeatedly will give you the biggest advantage over other applicants in your same situation. It is easier to be patient if you know what to expect.