Is Technology At the Heart of BofA's Mortgage Woes?
The Wall Street Journal this morning ran a story about Bank of America's mortgage foreclosure mess, which it inherited from Countrywide, in which it's "slogging through 102,000 foreclosure files, trying to fix any problems," the paper said.
According to the article, many of the problems are the result of faulty technology. Bank of America adopted Countrywide's homegrown mortgage-servicing software, but for more than a year during the integration process, the company used two systems that didn't communicate with each other.
Scanners that were installed to help address borrower complaints of lost paperwork for some reason didn't work and system changes required to rework loans under the Obama Administration's loan modification plan were a distraction, the article says.
Some of the problems, of course, can't be blamed on technology. Information was missing from many of the Countrywide mortgage documents. And the vast array of no-down-payment, adjustable-rate mortgages and interest-only loans that Countrywide distributed so freely have a lot to do with why so many borrowers are struggling to replay.
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