Where's my mortgage escrow refund check?

[mytwocents]

I'll make it as brief as I can -

My husband has been in Chapter 13 since June 09. I chose to not file.
We had our first mortgage with Washington Mutual. Now Chase owns the
mortgage.

The mortgage is not in the plan - we pay it ourselves. Never late. We only
have 3 more years to go on this first mortgage. Balance is @36K.

Got a letter in May from escrow dept of Chase, stating that they were
reviewing our loan. If escrow acct was over, we would get a refund check -
(mortgage company pays taxes and insurance).

When the June statement arrived, it said that an escrow refund check for $2125.00 was issued on May 19. Since I haven't received this check, I called Chase to find out what happened -

They state that since my husband is in Chapter 13 and my name is on this loan, they are holding the check until we complete our payments with them,
which means for the life of this loan(May 2013 is final payment). Oh, and I get interest on the $2125.00 !!! Wow. Not impressed.

They will not let me use this escrow amount as a payment. ( I asked).
They will not divide up the overpayment over the next 12 months(I asked).
They will not adjust my monthly payment. I asked. They said they might
consider it, but it was "highly unlikely".

Are mortgage companies allowed to do this? The assessed value of our
house went down by $100,000 this past year, so I'm expecting to "over pay"
for the next 3 years, now !

Questions: 1) What recourse do I have? What would you do?(legally, please!)
2) If I don't get any of this money until the loan is "satisfied", will we have to
give this 4 yr lump sum to the Trustee, since my husband will still be in Chapter 13?

Any suggestions?

Thanks in advance for your help!

[keepinitreal]

Your husband could meet with his bankruptcy attorney and find out if Chase could be compelled to give up the overage in the escrow account. Hopefully the lawyer can send Chase a threatening letter.

[catleg]

What state do you live in? Non community property I assume.
Is the house jointly owned, and the mortgage too?
I would guess there's a concern about whether the payments could be estate property, maybe 50% estate property, I don't really know enough to say.
Obviously you don't have a whole lot of leverage over them.
I'm thinking when the balance falls to the amount they owe you, then it's over.