Office of Loan Programs

Mail Solicitations and Bi-Weekly Payments
Jay Valancy
April 2002

From time to time, private marketing companies will solicit homeowners for a variety of home-related products or services. Some of the services and products recently offered throughout the lending arena include bi-weekly payment services, mortgage life insurance, and home improvement upgrades.

We wish to emphasize that the Office of Loan Programs does not sell or allow access to our mailing list. All loan data collected during loan processing and the servicing of your loan is maintained in a secure server. However, since real estate transactions are a matter of public record, private marketing companies are allowed to access the files of the County Recorder for name and address information.

As mentioned above, one of the most common solicitations today is for bi-weekly payment services. For a fee, private companies will deduct one-half of your monthly mortgage payment from your checking account every other week and forward the funds collected to the lender on a monthly basis. As these firms collect funds from you 26 times a year, the additional amount collected is applied to the loans’ principal balance and the mortgage is repaid faster. For example, if your payment is $1,000 a month, you would pay $12,000 a year in regularly scheduled monthly payments. If $500 is deducted from your checking account every two weeks, the amount collected would be $13,000 or, an additional $1,000 to principal. The fee for this service could vary from $250 to $400.

MOP borrowers who are on active payroll status are required to have their monthly payment deducted from their paychecks. So, for MOP borrowers, these services would only be applying any funds collected to the principal balance of the loan (curtailments) and not toward your monthly payment amount. Any MOP borrower may make a principal curtailment at any time, in any amount, to their MOP loan without any charges or pre-payment fees. For details on how to make a principal curtailment, please see our Frequently Asked Questions section or contact our office.

If you receive any calls that might indicate your personal data has been compromised, please contact our office immediately at either (510) 987-9000 or via e-mail at olp@ucop.edu.

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