Bank of America has been foreclosing on an average of seven thousand five hundred homes per month. According to an article on CNNMoney.com, BofA will proceed with 16 thousand foreclosures this month, but they will take a “holiday” between December 20th and January 2nd, suspending sales and evictions during that time. Bank of America has estimated they will have about 300 thousand foreclosures for 2010. 

Bank of America had humble beginnings when it was first started by founder A.P. Giannini in 1904. He had a radical idea to open a bank “to serve the little fellows”. The financial institute began as the Bank of Italy and Giannini grew his business, fought for the little guys and waged war on big interests until the very end, when he died in 1949. 

Fast forward sixty one years and Bank of America is one of the largest banks in the U.S. by assets, and has one of the country’s most extensive networks, with almost six thousand locations across the United States. At the end of fiscal year 2009 they had an income growth of over 56%. Starting in 2004 BofA made purchases (acquisitions or mergers) of companies at a rate of one and sometimes two a year, until the end of 2009. One acquisition they made in 2007 brought their asset worth to 1.7 trillion dollars; some of the places they acquired were FleetBoston Financial, MBNA, The United States Trust Company, LaSalle Bank Corp., Countrywide and Merrill Lynch.

When Countrywide was acquired in 2008 it gave Bank of America roughly 20-25% of the mortgage market, with around nine million mortgages. Then, in August of 2009 Taylor, Bean and Whitaker, the third largest FHA lender in the U.S. was raided by the Feds. Bank of America took on Taylor Beans mortgages. Now, at the end of 2010,   Bank of America has had thousands of complaints against them for the less than poor way they have handled mortgage customers over the last two years. For many of the Taylor Bean customers, the files were inaccurate or incomplete, but they were proceeding with collections and foreclosures. People from all over the United States are telling how they are getting the run around on applying for loan modifications or the Making Homes Affordable Plan. Paper work is “lost” (several times), and they have to keep refiling, or there is such a delay, they have to resubmit paper work so it’s up to date. No one who customers call at BofA knows what to tell them, except “keep making your payments until it’s all straightened out”; even though they have lost payments also.

It is a nightmare that some people have been dealing with for over a year, and some for almost two years. The foreclosures keep coming despite the efforts of home owners who are trying to comply with demands that keep changing and less than timely responses (or none at all) from the people who are supposed to be helping them.
  It seems the “little fellows” have been forgotten and Giannini’s fight against “big interests” ended with him. It also appears that too many big companies and important individuals have their hand in the Bank of America cookie jar; leaving little hope that any real intervention on behalf of the homeowners will ever happen.

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