Ok, I’m lost.
My mortgage company sends a bill every month that (paraphrased) says: “Your mortgage is X, your escrow is Y. Pay us Z (X+Y).”
How on earth were they getting a bill that didn’t include the escrow, and why would Chase let them go that long with short payments? Wouldn’t the sudden tax bills and homeowner’s insurance bill be a red flag that something went bad with the escrow account? (Or am I just too responsible?)
Depends...your state may require Escrow or, for those states that do not require monthly Escrow for Insurance and Taxes, the Loan Program may have required it.
There are lots of mortgages out there with only P and I payments.
For reasons of total confusion I swapped the numbers in the tens and hundreds position on a loan payment to Chase once resulting in a short payment of about $90. (I had the correct numbers in the numeric field, but where you write out the amount I screwed it up). Naturally they took the wrong part when they cashed the check. I got multiple letters, calls, had to pay a fee, etc. No way were these people likely to not be aware of the situation.
They were most likely just paying attention to the total amount due line.
Some people prefer to pay their insurance and taxes on their own rather than include it with their mortgage payments.
Who knows why they did not catch this. I would have.