The foreclosure process, basically speaking, is the steps through which your bank or lender repose your property. It has so many variables that is impossible to exactly mention the specific steps that a given foreclosure will go trough as well as the timeline that every foreclosure will take from beginning to end.

The foreclosure process starts after you have been behind in your mortgage for two or three months. The banks usually try to contact you regarding your late payments, but most of the homeowners never answer those calls. Your lender will file a Foreclosure Judgment at the local court, and you will receive a summon or notice informing you that your bank has initiated a foreclosure process against you.

At this point of the foreclosure process you have the opportunity to request a hearing in the circuit court. In this petition you will ask the judge for an opportunity to hear your part of the story, but unless you have a very unusual situation, you normally will lose this hearing, and the judge will concede the petition of foreclosure to your lender.

Once the bank has the court order, your property will be sold at a local property auction and you will be given one to three weeks, depending on your State to leave the property or the sheriff will remove you from your home by force.

The foreclosure process will vary from lender to lender and from State to State, but the steps are the same generally speaking. The time that your specific foreclosure will take will be determined essentially from the fight you put to delay the process and from the knowledge you have about the law and how to use it on your favor to stay in your home for a very long period of time.

The foreclosure process for some families is as short as two to three months and for some homeowners can be as long as two or three years. As I mentioned before it will all, ultimately, be up to the ability you have to use some strategies and tactics to stop the foreclosure over and over again.