I do not have any houses serviced by American Home, but have been tracking the progress of the mortgage payment servicers for mortgages during the mortgage meltdown. American Home is holding payments collected from borrowers and not forwarding the money to the lender as specified in their servicing contract. Their defense of the action is “it’s their (American Home’s) money while their bankruptcy is being sorted out by the courts.

While American Home does not effect me, I consider that nearly 25 percent of my mortgage payments are held in escrow to pay taxes and insurance. If American Home and other mortgage loan servicers are withholding funds from the lenders, will they release funds to pay taxes and insurance? I’ve paid the mortgage and escrow every month. Will I face a double whammy for a tax bill in October because the servicer stiffed me, too?

In papers filed with the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Wilmington, Del., Monday, Ginnie Mae cited worries about a “serious disruption” for homeowners whose mortgages are entangled in American Home’s collapse.

In an affidavit, Ginnie Mae executive Paul St. Laurent III said the agency has had to tap federal funds to cover payments owed to investors on American-Home-serviced loans, because the cash that should be coming from those mortgages is tied up in the bankruptcy.