Fed Ex Ltr from GMAC -- 2nd / pennies on the $ offer

[Joel Fraser]

I've posted before, but it's been a while. We have hardship ltrs, etc., into the 1st lenders on our 2 homes in CA. And I have 1 letter into the 2nd lender on our primary. The other home (a rental) we previously lived in (for about 6 months) AND got the refi before we moved out. The first is w/ ASC. I've been calling them several times a week just to verify that they have rec'd all the required documentation to begin the mod process. Loan balance is $417K. Home value is probably around $450K or so. (Sales are actually up! in our area right now; and this is in one of the "most desirable" neighborhoods.) Anyhow, I hadn't bothered contacting the 2nd because I didn't think it would be much use until we figured out if we even had a chance w/the 1st. Then we got a Fed Ex letter yesterday from them (GMAC). They offered a "pay-off" amount of about $10,800. My husband figured it out as 8% of the loan balance (about $132K). Well, we thought, hey, if we can make the 2nd "go away," maybe we can/should hang on to this house! (It's not our dream home, but we've lived in it before and could do so again. The first on our current primary is about $20K more AND the house needs lots of work.) GMAC wants to hear from us within the week. In order to make this work, we would still need a mod from ASC on the 1st. I did a bunch of catch up reading on the forum today and it seems ASC is still a bear for folks to work with. AND, we are only at the very beginning of the mod process with them. Any advice on how to handle this offer from GMAC? Anyone been in a similar situation? Is this a "too good to be true" scenario? We've already pretty much accepted that we are going to lose everything -- our primary, all our investments, our "good" credit, etc. But this seems like a possibility to retain something of value. Thanks for your feedback.