In Chicago, how long does it take for the process of foreclosure?

[banys]

I have been late in my mortgage for almost 4 months, i cannot afford the payments, i have TCF, as my lender, they said they do not participate in any of the home relief programs, so i have only been getting these interest only payment relief from them wich is still pretty high. my home is 90,000 underwater, so they will not refinance. I also have a sick child, so i am up to debt in bills... Today i received a letter from TCF, this is basically what is says:
Our records indicateyour account is in default. This letter is to advise you that you have 15 days to pay your balance owed, we will no longer accept late payments from you and that we will insist on strict compliance with the terms of your loan. If you fail to pay your total amount due, or if you fail to make future payments, we will require immediate payment of the balance of your loan and we may repossess the collateral without further notice to you.
If you have been in default in the past and this is not the first letter from us providing you with an opportunity to cure you default in order to avoid repossession, the 15 day period shown above assumes any payments or funds you have given to us in the past are collected and not returned unpaid. If any payments or funds you have given us are returned unpaid, we will repossess the collateral without waiting for the 15 day period to expire.


So i am a little concerned does this mean we can get evicted at any time with no notice of eviction, or how does the foreclosure process work, it's not that i don't want to pay we just lost jobs and we are in a lot of debt... Please if you have any similar situations any help would be appreciated. Also should i start packing?

[otis]

Foreclosure is a legal process so it will have to wind its way through the courts before you actually have to leave your residence. You will have to be served with a notice of foreclosure which is a summons to a court date (at the Daley Center, 18th floor I think but it will tell you exactly what room in the summons). At that hearing the judge will just want to know where things stand, he won't order you to vacate and will advise you that you will have another court date and you will receive notice of that other court date in the mail. The judge will also advise you that there are counselors there to help you (you would have passed them n the hallway). You don't have to pay them, they are provided by the government. You don't get evicted with no notice of eviction, TCF doesn't have some goons come, knock down your door and throw your stuff in the street. If you did absolutely nothing my guess is that sometime next spring (or later) a country sheriff would do that but there are a lot of steps you can take prior to delay or stop the process so don't even worry about that. There are thousands of people in Chicago in the same situation so everything is backed up.

Believe me, I feel your pain, but consider yourself in a plane that the pilot just died. You can either sit there and scream. "We're going to crash, we're going to crash!" or you can take the controls and say "I'm going to land this thing as best I can". Now I know you don't know how to fly a plane but informing yourself about the foreclosure process and getting help is going to be like speed reading the instruction manual. You are in a tough situation with the job loss and the sick child. Could be worse, if you were renting, the owner could get you out a lot quicker than TCF will be able to get you out so you can live rent free for a while you look for work rather than being homeless. Without a job or income, unless you have funds, win the lottery or have a rich and generous relative/friend, you won't be able to keep your house and if it goes into foreclosure you are going to take a major hit on your credit (equivalent to having a felony record when applying for a job). Two options are deed-in-lieu which is you give the house back to the bank,basically agree to walk away. You take a credit hit but not as bad. The other is a short sale. Get a realtor and put the house up for sale. You will be offered less than what you paid, probably less than what you owe but the bank might accept it as opposed to getting nothing. They really don't want the house because they aren't in the business of selling houses, they are in the business of making loans. Look up the terms deed-in-lieu and short sale on line to get more detail and send me and message with your phone number if you want to talk about this. Otherwise good luck and hope your kid gets well.