Do you qualify for lower payments?

From the Post and Courier 8/30/2010

Written By: Katy Stech

"Foreclosure counselors across the country keep running into the same scenario: Weary homeowners are struggling to make their mortgage payments, but they're too discouraged to begin the tedious process of asking their lender for help.

A loan modification approval can take months to secure, it requires mountains of paperwork and lenders have been notoriously disorganized throughout the process.

But a California-based software company is proposing a helpful fix for Charleston area homeowners.

CounselorDirect provides a website that home-owners can use to plug in basic information about their home to calculate their chances of qualifying for lower payments.

When deciding whether a homeowner qualifies for lower payments, lenders look at their monthly expenses and income.

So as users plug in their financial information into the system, it estimates whether they have enough remaining income.

"If you found out that by spending 10 dollars less per month in groceries, you could qualify for lower payments, would you do it?" said CounselorDirect spokesman Jason Kirshner.

The program recently partnered with Family Services Inc. of North Charleston, a nonprofit that provides free foreclosure counseling.

Homeowners can visit the agency's website at foreclosurehelpforsc.org, to see their chances of qualifying. And that information can later be passed onto a Family Services counselor."

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