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Lending Tree

Mortgage help not easy to get

Nathan Hurst writes for the Detroit News:

The predicament has consumers in a Catch-22: They're being told that even with spotless credit, they can't get help. Instead, they must miss payments, and even then assistance from the lender isn't a certainty. Lenders maintain they're doing what they can for struggling homeowners -- such as delaying an interest rate adjustment or lowering the interest rate cap on a homeowner's ARM. They also look at each person's situation to determine if they can refinance an ARM to a fixed-rate loan. But they admit that today's tight credit market is making it more difficult to help. "The rules for writing mortgages have changed," said Robert Rahal, president of Shore Mortgage in Birmingham, which sells only federally backed home loans. "In many cases, lenders are having to cut back on who they offer new loans for, and the refinance sector is feeling the pinch as well."