January 4, 2011
Auszug:
Indeed, though we didn’t move, our mortgage did. The original lender, The Dime Savings Bank of New York, was bought by Washington Mutual in 2002. For 15 years, till 2006, WaMu swallowed other banks as if they were hotdogs at a speed-eating contest. WaMu loved subprime loans, and worked mightily to dispel any stuffy-banker image. The bank even created “Action Teller” dolls of the Barbie-and-Ken type. (I’m not making this up. For years I had one in my office. You can find them on line for about $40.) In 2003, a year after buying the Dime, WaMu’s CEO Kerry Killinger said, “I think if we’ve done our job, five years from now you’re not going to call us a bank.”
The second half of the sentence was right: in September, 2008, WaMu became the largest bank failure in U.S. history, and its assets, including our little co-op loan, were picked up by J.P. Morgan Chase.
So it was to Chase that I made my request for a pay-off quote. I called at night, of course. Does anyone today pay a bill by daylight? The automated system informed me that I was “ineligible” for a payoff quote and would have to call during regular business hours, blah, blah. When I did, a perfectly nice, imperfectly trained woman took my information and put me on hold for what seemed like a long time; she returned, apologized for putting me on hold and thanked me for my patience, and told me that I had a co-op loan, as if I did not know, and that it was for an apartment in New York, a fact of which I was also aware, and put me on hold again, longer; she returned, repeated word for word her apology, and asked with whom I was refinancing. I pointed out that the balance on the loan was about $2,500 and that I was paying it off, not refinancing. This information was bewildering; I went back on hold. After the third identically phrased apology, I learned that she would pass my request to a special desk–I believe in Ohio, though I could be imagining that–that would send me the quote, but only by fax or by mail. A little rigamarole ensued while she filled in a form for the august Ohioans, and we bade goodbye.
The morrow came and with it a fax and a quote. It included a $30 fee for the fax. I did a brief calculation of my hourly value, thought, “Fuck it,” fired up Firefox, and fired off the dough. I then shot an e-mail to an address specified on the fax – coopesc@wamu.net — to request the return of my collateral documents. The bank has the original of our proprietary lease for the apartment. I wanted it back, not just because it is mine but because I am curious to know whether, after these peregrinations, the document is the bank or in the Fresh Kills landfill.
weiter unter:
www.bnet.com/blog/strategist/...am-paying-off-the-mortgage/407
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