In the event we refinance a HELOC when it matures due to it being after the maturity date or perhaps there was some type of problem which caused us to deem it better to refinance than to modify - would this be treated as a new account for all purposes? For example, the application disclosure would need to be given and we can charge an early termination fee that consists of only the third party costs we paid on the borrower's behalf if the borrower closes the account with 3 years as we do on a brand new HELOC...

Your loan matured, it's done and due. You cannot unring a bell.

Sounds like a new transaction to me.

Yes it is a new transaction, but how can you assess an early termination fee if the original HELOC matured???

If the HELOC did not matured and the bank is the one that chooses to treat the change as a refinance instead of a modification, I would be had pressed to impose an early termination fee as I would call that a UDAAP.

In the event we refinance ..... we can charge an early termination fee that consists of only the third party costs we paid on the borrower's behalf if the borrower closes the account with 3 years....

I would be very surprised if your state law would allow you to impose any type of a pre-payment penalty on the borrower when refinancing an existing loan with your financial institution into another loan with your financial institution.

You definitely would be in violation of IN law.

Sorry, I did not state the above clearly. We don't charge the early termination fee for a refinancing within our organization. I meant that if the HELOC is refinanced and therefore is a new transaction, we can contract for the early termination fee in the event the customer pays off the new HELOC within three years of origination - payoff meaning by cash or takeout at another institution.

I have a similar question. Can we charge a cancellation fee if the applicant cancels/withdraws a HELOC application before any note or agreement is signed? We incurred title fees before the HELOC was finalized. Can we recover these costs? Anybody have experince with this type of question?

That's a legal question to ask your attorney but unless you have a signed legal contract how do you intend to collect such a fee?