Many homeowners fight foreclosure by seeking the services of a lawyer to defend them. The foreclosure process is often difficult to comprehend, even for a lawyer. With varying procedural processes in courts and states, sometimes it is necessary to hire a foreclosure attorney to battle it out in a court. There are otherwise situations when you’ll probably not be needing a lawyer.

Which are these situations?

If your goal is to occupy the home during the foreclosure process, chances are you don’t need the service of an attorney. In property law cases, you are the legal custodian of your home until a foreclosure sale. Also, some states will allow you to extend your stay on the property until the expiration of the redemption period, the period given to homeowners to complete paying off the debt or the purchase price. In such a case, the house is yours until it finds a new owner. However, there are exceptions to this scenario. When or if a bank blocks you from accessing the property, an attorney can help you regain access to the house and get hold of your personal stuff.

Another reason you’ll back down on hiring an attorney is when you’re seeking additional time to reinstate the loan or refinance. This is something you can do by yourself, and all it requires is you filing a loan modification application to the bank. If the bank accepts your application, then you’ve just bought yourself some time to sort your mortgage issues. The bank will have to do a review again if at all your situation changes, especially if you’ve paid off portions of your mortgage within the additional period you applied for.

Rather than hiring an attorney, you can seek a free consultation from an HUD-approved housing counselor when you need help applying for a loan modification. The counselor will walk you through the steps of foreclosure and possibly assist you in avoiding it altogether.

In other instances, such as lack of defenses to the foreclosure, don’t waste your time and money hiring an attorney. If a mortgage servicer has been fair and lenient enough, or you stopped making payments honoring your mortgage, you simply don’t have substantial reason pursuing the case. Instead of pursuing the case and end up spending more, try financing another place to live with the money you could have paid an attorney.

Those are some but few cases you’d want to avoid property lawyers. During the mortgage period, it is important to assess your ability to make payments as agreed in the contract, and if there will be any difficulties to make prompt payments, then consider having an attorney ready. Estimates show that 1 out 200 homes face foreclosure. However, property law provides leeway for notices and opportunities before a foreclosure. Dealing with complex property cases, a real estate lawyer is the best person to handle it. They offer an experienced commercial or residential defense. So, weigh your options and situations correctly to establish if you really need a foreclosure attorney.