Bank bureaucracy adds to family’s hardship

CEDAR RAPIDS - A river can be understood, even if it can't be reasoned with. Angela and Jeff Fowler found you can't do either with corporate bureaucracy.

“The flood, we could put behind us,” said Angela Fowler. “The bank, you can't.”

The Fowlers have been trying to figure out their mortgage lender, U.S. Bank, since the Cedar River's June 13, 2008, crest put four feet of water through the first floor of their home at 904 H Ave. NW, just 18 months after they and their three daughters had moved in.

Three days after the crest, Angela Fowler called the bank.

“We asked U.S. Bank, ‘Are you going to work with us here, or do we give you the keys?' ” said Angela Fowler, 40. “They said they were going to work with us, and it's been a nightmare ever since.”

Turning down an offer from their credit union to finance a new house, the Fowlers set out to rebuild their home with what they thought was their lender's approval. Four months after the flood and despite continued assurances, U.S. Bank filed to foreclose on the Fowlers, who hadn't missed a mortgage payment before the flood.

After two years, U.S. Bank suddenly dropped its foreclosure case in October, but the bank has refused the Fowlers' attempts to make payments on their mortgage, leaving them in legal limbo.

“They want to pay for their house,” said Corey Luedeman, senior staff attorney at Iowa Legal Aid in Cedar Rapids. “They have made repairs to the collateral. They decided not to walk away. The only reason they fell behind was due to the flood.”

U.S. Bank officials declined to comment on the Fowlers' case, citing privacy.

Angela Fowler saved every piece of bank correspondence and made notes during every phone conversation with its employees. The notes now fill a banker's box - “what I call my files, my haul-it-away-upstairs-and-I-bawl-my-eyes-out box.”

The Fowlers estimate they've spent more than $100,000 on house repairs - well above its $69,782 pre-flood assessed value. They received $28,800 from the Federal Emergency Management Agency and $17,270 from the state's Jumpstart program. The rest was their own money.

Angela Fowler said they initially qualified for a forgivable Jumpstart loan of nearly $52,000, but the program suspended payments after the bank's foreclosure. That led to a contractor's suit against the couple, since settled.

“I quit going through Jumpstart just because of the headaches,” said Angela Fowler. “It humiliated us. The whole thing's been embarrassing.”

Most of the FEMA money went into the basement, where the rear wall was washed out.

The family - Angela; Jeff, 35; daughters Hailey, 11; Brittany, 13; and Amanda, 18 - rented an apartment until Dec. 1, 2008, when they were able to return home. Jeff Fowler, a union pipe fitter, is still working on the basement, but the upstairs living area is finished.

Angela Fowler was cautiously optimistic one recent afternoon. After months of inactivity, a U.S. Bank attorney had called Luedeman. The Fowlers were asked to submit a hardship letter, pay stubs and other proof of income. Again.

“This is where it all starts again,” said Angela Fowler. “We've got to mail them all the stuff, and it goes nowhere. This will be the 15th, 20th time I've mailed them this stuff.”

Still, “there's never been a real person from U.S. Bank that's called Corey,” she said. “At least they're communicating, and it's their attorney.”

At least the hardship letter will be easy. Fowler pulls a copy of a handwritten letter she wrote to the bank in September 2009.

“I'll just copy it and change the date,” she said.