SHOULD THE PRICE OF ANY SERVICE BE INCREASED IF THE BUYER IS DESPERATE FOR THAT SERVICE? Anyone with a set of morals would say absolutely not. But that's what's happening today in the foreclosure rescue industry. Many rescue companies are increasing their fees as the foreclosure crisis spirals out of control. In a highly unregulated industry with most of the employees working on a 100% commission basis, you can imagine how greed comes into play.



I WAS CURIOUS ABOUT THIS MINDSET and I wanted to see if it was as bad as I thought. So I called a friend who runs a real estate consulting firm and asked why this was. “Simply put, because they can. Most homeowners who call these companies are in such a panic and not thinking rationally, that it makes for an easy sale. It's the ultimate lay down. There's also a supply and demand factor in play too.”

THEN I LOOKED ONLINE BECAUSE I FIGURED; that's where most people go for information on any given subject or service. I ran a Google search for “Foreclosure Advice” and approximately 90% of the results were for foreclosure rescue services. None of the sites gave any fees, so I called most of the companies on the first 2 pages of my search. on Google. Of the 7 companies I was able to speak with, I was quoted fees ranging from $1,500 for basic representation, all the way up to $3,300 for a ‘deluxe” package that would also “clean up” any negative marks on my credit report. A representative at one company told me, “You have no choice, you HAVE to do this and we're your only hope – otherwise you will be out on the street!” Talk about a hard sell! You have to be kidding me.

OVER THE PAST 24 MONTHS the foreclosure rescue industry has quadrupled in size, feeding off of the housing crisis. For the most part it's unregulated, so it's like the Wild West right now, anything goes. It's like the mortgage business was 10- 12 years ago with Loan Officers charging unlimited points and fees to borrowers with shaky credit. A change for the better will come for this industry, but it may take a while.

AFTER 13 YEARS OF SAVING PEOPLE FROM FORECLOSURE, HERE'S HOW I WOULD GO ABOUT GETTING HELP: The first thing I would do is conduct a search on Google for “DIY foreclosure” or “DIY Loss Mitigation”. The idea here is to find out how some of the experts in the industry would get out of foreclosure & learn from them. There you'll find several sights that give strong advice on stopping or stalling your foreclosure – most of the information is presented in the form of a downloadable PDF file that you can save to your computer. By doing this your educating yourself about the subject (seriously, how much do you really know about foreclosure?) and your not spending thousands of dollars with a total stranger for a service that you could probably handle yourself.