Mortgage Loan Modification

A crucial portion of your application for a loan modification is writing a good financial hardship letter. Write the letter to your lending institution and submit it with all your other modification application papers. A good hardship letter should:

1. tell why you need a loan modification
2. propose a reasonable modification
3. reiterate your commitment to keeping your home and paying down your mortgage

The most important thing to convey in your letter is that you aren’t a flakey person. This didn’t happen because of something you did – you got in these financial dire straits because of a financial crisis that no one ever could have predicted. You would ordinarily never ask for this type of help, but if your lender will give you another chance and modify your loan you will never default again.

Brevity and conciseness are two important things to remember when writing your modification hardship letter. If possible your letter should be a page in length, but definitely not more than two pages. The person who reads these letters is a busy employee and probably won’t give a long and winding letter the same attention as a brief and to-the-point one.

Keep the tone of your letter professional. Write out a rough draft and correct all misspellings or incidences of bad grammar before you turn in a final copy. It may help to have someone else proofread it for you. Hardship templates on the Web can help you decide how to compose your letter, if you like.

When you write a hardship letter to your lender, be frank. Don’t downplay or up play your situation; just tell it like it is. If your situation is serious enough that you really do need a modification on your mortgage, your lender will be able to hear it in your letter.