JPMorgan Chase & Co. unveiled programs to help military and veteran customers stay in their homes as it seeks to repair its image after wrongly foreclosing on military families and overcharging thousands for mortgages.
"This company has a great history of honoring military and veterans, and the mistakes we made on military foreclosures are a painful aberration on that track record," Chairman and Chief Executive Jamie Dimon said.
The programs, which begin in April, include reduced mortgage rates for those covered under the Servicemembers Civil Relief Act. For military personnel who have been on active duty as far back as Sept. 11, 2001, it will offer enhanced mortgage modifications. The company also said it wouldn't foreclose on any currently deployed active military personnels' homes, and if there were ever a wrongful foreclosure sale on the home of an eligible military customer, that the bank would forgive all of their remaining mortgage debt.
JPMorgan also will donate 1,000 homes to military personnel and veterans over the next five years.
The company appointed Maggie Belknap, a retired colonel and former head of the economics and finance faculty at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, as head of oversight for the lenders' SCRA programs.
Last week a JPMorgan Chase executive, at a U.S. House hearing, apologized for wrongly foreclosing on military families and overcharging thousands for mortgages, as lawmakers weigh whether new legislation is needed to help prevent military personnel from losing their homes and getting hit with high interest rates.
JPMorgan Chase initially found it overcharged at least 4,000 military personnel in active service and took the homes of 14. However, Chase's testimony Wednesday shows the firm now has found more problems — it said it overcharged 4,500 active-duty military members and wrongly foreclosed on 18.
