“Some advocates were particularly surprised to find that Ocwen had used the waivers, considering the servicer has been leading the industry in doing loan modifications. But Paul Koches, general counsel for Ocwen, said his company was just as surprised, and called their inclusion a mistake.
The waivers had been “fairly standard practice” in loan agreements for years, he said. But in late 2008, after meeting with representatives of the National Community Reinvestment Coalition and hearing concerns about the waivers, Ocwen agreed to remove them from all loan modification agreements.
The company assumed all the waivers were gone, until Thompson’s testimony showed otherwise. Ocwen then realized one of its old forms still included the waiver. Ocwen is working to fix the form. Only a handful of borrowers were affected, and they’ll be assured the waivers won’t be enforced, Koches said.”
