Legal Question in Real Estate Law in California

With all the thousands of lenders out there, it's not possible to say what gets a particular lender excited about cooperating with a particular borrower. My guess is that borrowers who are in hopeless financial trouble will be dumped off the modification conveyor belt early on, and also those who don't really need a mod will not warrant prompt and full attention. It's like a triage at the scene of a disaster -- the nurses won't waste resources on you if you're going to die anyway, nor will they waste resources on you if all you need is a band-aid and an aspirin. Also, I don't think it usually makes sense to self-inflict wounds like missing payments you could make, but very possibly that could be an element in a very sly way to play the game. Bottom line is policies will differ from lender to lender.