Vietnam veteran unknowingly loses home to foreclosure over $2,800 debt

CHARLOTTE — Ray Wilson, 77, who served in Vietnam, owned a house on Polk and White roads in northeast Charlotte.

“He’s always been self-sufficient, and he’s always done well for himself,” said Tiffany Saunders, Wilson’s daughter.

However, the mortgage company sent him letters between 2020 and 2022, which stated that he owed around $2,800.

The letters said that he must pay or face foreclosure.

Wilson said he doesn’t remember seeing any of the notices.

“I was living there, been living there for about 15 years and this happened,” he said.

The mortgage company foreclosed on his home.

A company called Four Corners of Charlotte bought it in April.

Wilson and his daughter told Action 9′s Jason Stoogenke they didn’t realize his house wasn’t his anymore until a month or two later.

“Something told me just to look it up in public records and it stated that the house had been sold,” Saunders said. “And I called, and I was like, ‘Dad you sold your house?’ and he said, ‘No.’”

However, it was sold.

Both sides told Stoogenke the same thing. August rolled around and Four Corners gave Wilson 10 days to move out. He didn’t, and in the middle of that month, deputies padlocked the house.

“I couldn’t think of (anything) that I could physically do about it, so I just went ahead and started taking my stuff out (of) the house,” Wilson said.

Four Corners said it offered Wilson $5,000 and to pay his moving expenses. It said Wilson agreed but then changed his mind. Wilson and his daughter recall some of that, but not all of it.

Either way, the bottom line is that Wilson lost his house for less than $3,000.

“It happened to me,” he said.

And it appears Four Corners got a good deal on the home.

Stoogenke looked at property records for the house and found that when Wilson bought it in 2008 it was valued at $122,500.

The house was valued at $501,500 in March.

Four Corners bought it in April for $263,550.

Other companies have been eyeing the same street.

One developer already bought almost a dozen of the parcels.

Advice:

• Read all your mail, especially financial mail, even if you don’t recognize the company. Your lender may have sold your mortgage to a company you’ve never heard of. Bottom line: There’s no such thing as junk mail.
• If you have a concern, tackle it right away.
• If anyone tells you something that helps your cause, get it in writing.

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