NAPLES, Fla. — A North Naples man turned to Fox 4 when he says he was on the verge of being evicted from his home of 24 years.
The double whammy of losing his wife to cancer and the arrival of Hurricane Irma pushed him back on his heels financially.
The owner of the trailer park ordered Peter Drinkwater to return his home to its original state or sell it. Thankfully Peter's insurance company came through with the money needed to fix all the damage, but the biggest insurance check was made out to both he and the mortgage holder Wells Fargo bank which would not cash the check.
Peter battled the bank but was told he was not entitled to all the money. When it was over Wells Fargo took half of the $28,000 due to Drinkwater to pay off the remainder of his mortgage and sent him the difference. Peter said he was so worn out battling Wells Fargo that he just gave in - signing the check and taking whatever money he could.
Attorney Thomas Chase of Fort Myers says this is a cautionary tale. He says fighting any large financial institution is always difficult unless you have an attorney or advocate looking out for you.
According to Chase, a call to the State Public Advocate's office could get you a representative for as little as a hundred dollars. And he says when you are fighting for thousands of dollars that kind of representation at the bargaining table is well worth it.
For Peter, his situation changed dramatically when the Fox 4 Investigative Team called the regional Wells Fargo representative in Miami.
Several days later we received an email that stated: "We have reached out to Mr. Drinkwater to apologize for how the situation was handled. We've also let him know that Wells Fargo will address his concerns by refunding the money used to pay off his loan balance."
But it gets better. Wells Fargo also let us know that Peter's original loan balance would be considered paid in full! In other words, the bank wrote Peter a check for almost $14,300 and waived the balance owed.
As Peter later told us, "Fox 4 was in my corner. What happened wouldn't have happened if it wasn't for you. Never in a million years."
Wells Fargo has been hit with some bad publicity of late, so it was nice to see the bank step up and do what's right.
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If you have a problem that requires our help, contact Frank Cipolla at Frank.Cipolla@fox4now.com.
