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Wachovia

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WACHOVIA

In 1879, William Lemly opened Wachovia National Bank in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. It grew to become one of the largest banks in the Southeast. In 2006, Wachovia purchase Golden West Financial for approximately $25.5 billion. The purchase was finalized before Wachovia thoroughly examined Golden West's mortgage portfolio. Wachovia entered the mortgage loan market through the Golden West acquisition, and became Wachovia Mortgage. Once in the mortgage market, the number of mortgage loans to individuals drastically increased. Many of the mortgage loans were packaged with variable interest rates. These adjustable-rate mortgages increased the original loan amount, allowing Wachovia's to earn additional revenues from the …show more content…

HOME LOAN LEGACY

Wachovia adopted the Pick-A-Payment product, often called option adjustable-rate mortgages(option-ARMs), after it bought Golden West Financial in 2006, which exposed Wachovia to the bigger mortgage loan market. Wachovia didn't get rid of these risky mortgage from its books. "They had plenty of time to sell them, but rather than get rid of the product, they promoted it." said Tony Plath , an associate banking professor at the University of North Carolina-Charlotte, in Tom Shean's article How Wachovia came crashing down.

This " Pick-A-Payment" system will allow the customers to make lower payments which didn't even cover the interest on the loan. According to David Mildenberg, the author of Wachovia Moves to Assure Borrowers Understand Loans, " Almost 70 percent of Wachovia's borrowers choose to pay as little as possible." The unpaid portion gets added back to principle, this will lead homeowner farther away from the payoff date. When the loan amount exceeds the value of a home, home owners may stop to pay and the house will go default which can backfire on the bank.

Wachovia was selling series of mortgage loans that customers couldn't afford. The more loans that were approved, the more outside brokers and the bank will make. There was no minimum credit-score requirement for the underwriting process. But many Wachovia mortgage loan customers were suffering paying off their house loans. In the A Charlie Brown Christmas (foreclosure) story

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