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Wells Fargo Agrees to $500,000 Calif. Mortgage Class Action Settlement
By Kimberly Mirando
UPDATE: 4/19/13: Judge Spero preliminarily approves settlement on third try.
UPDATE 3/26/13: A federal judge denied the California Wells Fargo Mortgage Settlement and has asked attorneys to clarify its fairness for Class Members.
Wells Fargo Bank has agreed to pay $500,000 to delinquent mortgage holders that were allegedly tricked into making payments on properties headed into foreclosure as part of a class action lawsuit settlement deal filed with the court yesterday.
California homeowners and plaintiffs Gustavo Reyes and Maria Teresa Guerrero sued the bank in 2010 alleging it violated California consumer protection and debt collection laws by sending letters to borrowers who were behind in payments saying Wells Fargo would consider modifying their loans if they sent in six more loan payments. Wells Fargo, however, did not explicitly guarantee a loan modification.
About 28,000 homeowners received these letters containing the special forbearance agreement, although it’s not clear how many of these people will be eligible to participate in the proposed class action settlement.
Reyes and Guerro asked the court to approve the deal on Monday saying, “The proposed settlement is fair, reasonable, adequate and worthy of preliminary approval because $500,000 is the maximum class relief available under the Rosenthal Fair Debt Collections Act. This is the maximum relief available under any theory because this court dismissed plaintiffs’ contract claims … and held that restitution of trial payments is not available under the Unfair Competition Law.”
The case is Gustavo Reyes et al. v. Wells Fargo Bank NA, Case No, 10-cv-01667, U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California.
The plaintiffs are represented by Steve W. Berman and Thomas E. Loeser of Hagens Berman Sobol Shapiro LLP, by Peter B. Fredman of the Law Office Peter Fredman and by David Pivtorak of the Law Office of David Pivtorak.
Updated April 19th, 2013
All class action and lawsuit news updates are listed in the Lawsuit News section of Top Class Actions
2 thoughts onWells Fargo Agrees to $500,000 Calif. Mortgage Class Action Settlement
this was my experience
I too have been charged fees, for the past year. I filled bankrupsy chapter 7 and did not include my mortgage with Well Fargo. I continued to pay an extra 300 to 400 dollars a mo. and for the past two mo. I called in my payments and asked do i own any more on any thing else they tell me “no”, today I recieved a statement for payment in April with a 200.00 late fee and 25.00 other fee. I asked the lady at wellfargo to tell me what the other fee is and she told me a bounced check fee from the year 2011. OMG and she told me that I owe the 200 late fee because I was in bankrupsy. she also told me that i owe a 100.00 fee for them driving by inspecting my home while in BK. OMG. I am so sick of them, they turned me down 3 times to help refi on the home motification program. I filled out all the papers and sent them in. They never answered the phone when I called so i left 20 some messages. Finally I called and they told me I did not qualify because I needed to add in my school loans, that haven’t kicked in yet. Why did they not tell me this the first time. I really think Wells fargo does not care for people or to help them. Please help.
Kathy