On our way in to our Early Childhood class today, we stopped in the school’s restroom. The boys have long ago decided which stall belongs to which boy, but there was a lady in one stall, so the boys took turn using the other one. N was first, and after washing his hands, he took it upon himself to grab a couple of papers hanging sticking out of my bag. “What is this, Mama?” he asked. “Nothing, N,” I said, “It’s just a letter from our bank.” “Hey, O!” he yelled across the restroom, “Mama got another letter from her bank!”
As the nice teacher exited the restroom stall and moved to wash her own hands, she looked at me a tad piteously, I thought. Poor thing – in arrears with the bank again; times are tough all over, I imagined her thinking. Now, I don’t know where N got the another part, but the letter from our bank wasn’t addressed to me personally. It was a form letter the likes of which many Americans are seeing (that is, perhaps, if they’re lucky) reassuring me that our bank is in sound fiscal health with low and broad exposure to risk. Well, good, I guess. Yeah for us.
It wasn’t until O had washed his hands too and we were actually leaving the restroom that I noticed that Noah had another piece of mail in his hand, now partly ripped open and damp with water from the sink. I glanced at the contents of the familiar-looking envelope, and noticed that it was a letter from our mortgage holder, Country*wide Ho*me Lo*ans. Country*wide bought our mortgage from the bank that first issued it, and was, at that time, America’s biggest private mortgage company. It was then taken over by Bank of Am*erica, which is now the U.S.’s largest commercial bank by market capitalization, owning what is, as far as I can tell, still America’s biggest private mortgage company.
Countryw*ide has been criticized, sued, and fined in recent years for everything from horrible treatment of Katrina survivors to widespread and aggressive predatory lending and systematic discrimination against minorities by improperly steering them to high-cost loans, in addition to internal corruption and violation of labor laws. At least ten states, including California, Texas, and Florida, worked together and filed suit against Country*wide, accusing them of unfair and deceptive practices to get homeowners to apply for risky mortgages far beyond their means. This suit was recently settled as part of the Bank of A*merica acquisition. From 2005 to 2007 Cou*ntrywide CEO Ang*elo R. M*ozilo sold much of his CFC stock, realizing $291.5 million in profits, resulting in a class-action suit being filed by shareholders alleging securities violations. In May 2008, Mo*zilo made the news by accidentally hitting "reply" instead of "forward" in response to an e-mail from a Country*wide customer under mortgage stress. His reply described the customer's plea as "disgusting".
Last month, Countryw*ide endeared itself to our little family yet more, by sending a letter to our household (and all its’ other mortgage customers) to inform that some of their employees had stolen identity information that contained social security numbers and birth dates. Co*untrywide apologized in the letter and offers free credit monitoring for 90 days. to be on the safe side, I recently applied for this thoughtful free service, and thought that perhaps the letter in my hand was a follow-up confirming our enrollment.
But no. The letter N was messing with was the same as last week’s, and the one from the week before that. It offers our family “fast cash for strapped budgets”, and suggests we call a 1-800 number as soon as possible “before time runs out” so we can consider the many flexible refinance options available to us and get quick cash in our pockets. It suggests that we refinance our perfectly good, non-ARM mortgage at an excellent interest rate, the kind that isn’t posing a great risk to either our family or our economy (as long as we don’t lose our jobs or need to move), and trade it in for a high-risk version or some cash in exchange for the little bit of home equity we have left. Because we should all feel entitled to take advantage of Country*wide’s “long standing commitment to lowering the barriers to home ownership and to educating consumers”.
The parent discussion topic today was anger. Somehow, we managed to keep the subject to the kind of anger we feel towards those we love and not those who profit from greed or run our country.
