If you are struggling at this time with an unaffordable mortgage loan and are afraid you might lose your home, this must be good news. Not only this, even if your lender has turned down your application for mortgage modification, you are given the opportunity to request to be considered for this package. But one question arises: How do you qualify to take your share of the package?

First, you must be a non-delinquent borrower. Remember that the package has been designed with eligible homeowners in mind, with those doing their best to keep their mortgage payments current in spite of their financial hardship.

Second, you need to be able to prove you currently occupy your home as your primary residence. Third, if you are a borrower with high total debt level, you must be willing to undergo HUD-certified consumer debt counselling.

Furthermore, your mortgage balance must not be more than 9,750.00 by the time of your application. You must also be able to show that no less than 31% of your gross monthly income goes to your current mortgage payments (inclusive of taxes and insurance). Also, the loan must have been initiated before January 1, 2009 and insured by Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac.

You will therefore have to prepare sufficient documentation to prove that you are qualified as you will have to submit yourself to a full disclosure process.

This includes your proof of income and expenses along with a completely filled mortgage modification form. This must be done with care and diligence if you are to get your share of the President’s mortgage modification package.

The lender is willing to work with you and the government even has free loan counseling but your best advocate is someone working on your behalf, not the lenders or for some non-profit.  I don’t mean pay a large upfront fee, don’t do that.  I suggest hiring a real estate attorney with a small upfront retainer that only charges for success and not submissions.  A good starting point is through a free online evaluation.

If you hire a third party to represent you then you should expect the lender to recognize the third party agreement within 48 hours.  The lender should also acknowledge receipt of a full loan modification submission with 48 hours of your providing the third party all the requested documentation.

You should contact your lender directly even after hiring a representative (Trust but Verify) and make sure the rep has established a relationship on your behalf and has submitted a FULL MODIFICATION PACKAGE promptly.  Be very alarmed if your representative suggests intentionally getting further delinquent on your mortgage when you can in fact pay.

The Making Home Affordable program can provide payment relief for borrowers that have NEVER been late.  Lastly, these modifications no longer take that long so 2-4 weeks is now a reasonable response time, if your rep is telling you something different then your file is just sitting in the pile.  The clock is ticking on this 75 Billion dollar government subsidy so don’t wait to apply and get impatient if nothing seems to be happening.

This program will end sooner than you think and many homeowners that continue to make their agreed payments are plenty jealous to see others get bailed out while they are on the hook.  If you think you might qualify for the generous program then at least do the fee online evaluation.  This is the opposite of a normal refinance.  In this program- Bad credit is good, low income is better than high income, delinquency is better than timely payments so now you will qualify if you would normally be turned down.

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