I fought for my house.It was scheduled to be auctioned in a foreclosure sale May 20, 2016.It wasn't really MY house, actually. It was the house that legally belonged to my soon to be ex-husband.My future ex-husband had decided to walk away from all of our mutual bills, including our mortgage. Unable to afford this mortgage on my income alone at the time as well as all the other bills, I decided to stop paying on the mortgage.So here's how it went down:My ex-husband decided to go silent for 6 months. He had no interest in discussing adult matters, such as the divison of property.One night, as I sorted through yet another box of his belongings, I decided I had enough of his silent treatment. The box I looked through contained pictures of his college trip to Jamaica with his friends and I thought it would really be shitty if I just started tossing these things out. I messaged him letting him know.Surprisingly, he decided to put on his adult pants for a minute and come discuss the future of the property.The house had equity in it. His mom, who was onced a licensed realtor, suggested he begin the process of a short sale.The house had equityu2026this meant if we both got our heads out of the shitter and worked together to sell the house, we could split that equity, catch up on our own bills and maybe have enough of a down payment on our own places.My lawyer said this would be the smartest thing to do.His lawyer, however, stated that she did not specialize in property law and, with the help of my future ex-husbandu2019s parents, recommended that he get a restraining order against me.This was the state of affairs at the end of March 2016.We decided to save the house.I looked into foreclosure laws and legal assistance and anything to delay the auction. I found that New Hampshire does not give a fuck about bank foreclosure, probably because most people in this state tend to be wealthy in comparison to other states. The rate at which houses are lost to foreclosure here is not a regular problem.In New Hampshire, there is no judicial process.If you are behind on your mortgage and your lender has set the time frame for bank repossession and posted the auction in a local paper for 3 consecutive weeks, they can hold a sale outside your home on date stated in paper and then move to evict you.Every lawyer I spoke with had recommended bankruptcy. That would not work because he had been fired from his job recently and would not be able to show that he could make bankruptcy payments.I didn't know what to do, so I recommended filing a motion to Enjoin the Foreclosure. I didn't know what Enjoin meant, but I figured it might delay the auction. I would later find that it meant we were suing the mortgage company.He halfheartedly filled out the form at the courthouse. The form lacked in specificity.I began researching the hell out of case law and opinions in the State of New Hampshire. I also researched any previous problems and complaints with the mortgage company. I studied all the paperwork he signed and tried to find a loophole.I was coming up with nothing.Actually, I was finding that people who were Pro Se loved to file motions to Enjoin foreclosures, basically arguing that their loan was transferred to another mortgage company during the time of ownership and because of the transfer, they did not owe anyone money for their home. Huh? They wanted their home for free? Because they stopped paying on it? And now it was someone else's fault? Because the bank transferred the loan? Well, that was the dumbest thing I ever heard. And the more I read, the more I learned that judges thought so too..I directed him to begin communicating with the mortgage company and to find out how much we owed to catch up on the mortgage.He had money in his 401k which could possibly cover the amount past due. He was terminated, so it was possible to cash out on this money with tax consequences, of course.He reluctantly contacted the mortgage company. His prior experience with their customer service was awful. They would tell him something and then not follow through. But he called them to gather more information, specifically how much to pay off the amount in default.And they promised to send him the information.The funny thing about mortgage companies is that they show no signs of urgency when they are about to reclaim your propertyu2026especially if there is equity.They never sent him the information they promised.As it got closer to May 20th, we were informed that there was a QDRO hold on his 401k.u2026It's good to know about the imposition of a Qualified Domestic Relations Order, or QDRO (cue-DRO), an exception to the 10% penalty on distributions from a qualified plan (but not an IRA).In case of a divorce, it's good to know about Qualified Domestic Relations Orders.A QDRO is often put into place as part of a divorce settlement, especially when one spouse has a considerably larger retirement plan balance than the other. The court determines what amount (usually a percentage, although it could be a specific dollar amount) of a retirement plan's balance is to be presented to the non-owning spouse. Once that amount is determined and finalized by the court, a QDRO is drafted and provided to the non-owning spouse, which allows him or her to direct the retirement plan custodian to distribute the funds in the amount specified.QDRO Rules Use of 401(k) in DivorceThis meant that his money was stuck until the we agreed to who got what. And our next scheduled court date was cutting this close.So we canceled our divorce. His lawyer tried to change his mind. She really wanted to divorce me because I was such a pain in her assu2024 My lawyer shook his head and kind of laughed a little to himself. He was a cool guy.Meanwhile, our case was remanded to federal court which meant that it could take a bit before it was heardu2026pushing us closer to the deadline.A lawyer from the mortgage company reached out to my husband(no longer future ex). He demanded to know how much money he had. My husband told him 8k. He said that would not be enough to cover the costs. My husband demanded to know what those costs were. The lawyer promised to send him the information.We never received any information.Instead, we received a response from the attorney for the mortgage company in federal court stating all the reasons that they were not obligated to remove the house from foreclosure. These reasons included, lack of communication between my husband and the mortgage company for a plan(stating that if he had reached out, he would have known who had he talked to and when), lack of money my husband would be able to acquire even if there were a reinstatement plan(he stated that he had 8k and so the call from the attorney was just to find out more ways to fuck us and not to come to some type of agreement), and lastly, that the company did not have to help by providing a reinstatement plan as was stated in the loan agreement.That pissed me offu2024 And my response was so damn good that it changed the judges mindu2026and the mortgage companyu2019s reluctance to follow through and work with usu2024 as well as the attorney's douchebaggery.The mortgage attorney even requested to have the lawyer who was now respresenting my husband contact himu2026umu2024 that was no lawyer. That was me. A very pissed off me who had nothing but time on her hands to make him look like a fool for underestimating the power of a pissed off Sara.Oh and my response prompted an opinion to be published in New Hampshire law.. In his objection to the motion to dismiss, however, he provides additional factual background about his efforts to resolve the mortgage default with Pacific Union. He also states that the divorce proceeding has ended with a reconciliation between Angell and u2024 and that he would like to pay the amount required to reinstate the mortgage but has not been able to do so because Pacific Union has not provided him with the required payment amount.Pacific Union has represented to the court that the foreclosure sale was cancelled u201cin order to allow exploration of loss mitigation efforts.u201d Pacific Union also represents that the foreclosure sale has not been rescheduled.DiscussionIn the complaint, Angell seeks to enjoin the foreclosure sale of his home. The foreclosure sale has been cancelled and has not been rescheduled. Therefore, at present, there is no foreclosure sale to enjoin. Pacific Union moves to dismiss the action on the ground that Angell has no right to reinstate or modify the mortgage and that Angell has not stated any other cause of action. In his objection to the motion, Angell agrees that he has not fulfilled the reinstatement requirement in the mortgage but argues that is because of Pacific Unionu2019s failure to prthe reinstatement amount. He also agrees that he has no right to modify the mortgage but argues that he is entitled to relief based on a new theory of promissory estoppel. Given Angellu2019s pro se status and the change in circumstances and theories since the complaint was filed, it is appropriate to give him an opportunity to amend the complaint to allege facts to support a new cause of action. See Fed. R. Civ.P. 15(a). In addition, it appears that Pacific Union may be working with Angell to resolve the matter, which would be a better way to end the case. Therefore, the motion to dismiss is granted, but Angell will be given leave to file an amended complaint to allege a new claim or new claims. Pacific Union may respond as appropriate under the Local Rules and the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure.Civil No. 16-cv-167-JD Opinion No. 2024 DNH 104Updated Outcome:They had promised to prus with an amount to bring the loan current and then ignored every attempt to reach out to them, either by putting us through to Voicemail (left a message and it was not returned), hanging up on us, or telling us that it was in the mail. They did not want to help.Each time we talked to someone from the mortgage company, we recorded the date, time, and the name of the person. We also took notes on the results of the call.In my objection, I wrote of all the runaround that they were giving us and the failure to do one simple thing, prus with the amount to pay in order to reinstate.They started to work with after we filed the objection citing promissory estoppel, even before the judge had ruled that we could reopen a case against them for failure to follow through.They cancelled the foreclosure proceedings and referred us to loss mitigation who provided us with the paperwork for a loan modification.We didn't have to pay the whole past due amount. We only needed to make $400/month payments for 6 months. If we continued to make these payments on time, then we could ask them to review it and, upon review, they would determine if they would allow us to reinstate the loan.They did allow us to reinstate.We didn't have to pay for their attorney, as they had threatened us with earlier in the process.Our interest rate went up a bitu2024 but there is still equity in our house.And we have never been late on a payment sinceu2026