AG-Bank deals revived

After hitting serious snags, foreclosure settlement talks between major banks and a coalition of state and federal officials are back on track and could wrap up within two weeks, The Post has learned.

Despite a number of setbacks that jeopardized the yearlong negotiations, a pact to settle claims of mortgage abuses, including the notorious robo-signing scandal, could be reached by early or mid-November, sources said.

While sources cautioned that the on-again, off-again multistate talks could hit another roadblock, one bank official said, ���It feels more real than it has in the past.”

Some sources said they even hoped to have a foreclosure deal in place to coincide with President Obama’s plan announced yesterday to revamp a program for helping “underwater” homeowners.

However, the protracted talks, led in part by Iowa Attorney General Tom Miller, may not result in a 50-state agreement that originally called for roughly $25 billion to compensate homeowners.

Instead, negotiators will be happy to bag the biggest state, California, whose attorney general, Kamala Harris, walked away from the negotiating table earlier this month, throwing the talks into doubt.

Now, it appears that California, which has suffered one of the highest foreclosure rates in the country, is back on board, according to a source.

The same cannot be said of New York after AG Eric Schneiderman got bounced from a key committee negotiating the terms of the settlement for refusing to grant banks broad legal immunity as part of the deal.

All 50 state AGs last year announced they were investigating foreclosure procedures following widespread complaints that lenders were using flawed documentation to seize homes.

One of the main sticking points has been whether to grant banks broad immunity from further lawsuits tied to the mortgage fiasco.

On the table now is a limited release that would grant banks immunity from future lawsuits involving the origination and packaging of mortgages into bonds.

Mortgage servicers are also negotiating releases tied to their relationship with loan-processing company Mortgage Electronics Registration Systems, which has been accused of botching millions of loan documents.

Terms of the foreclosure deal may also entail banks offering assistance to homeowners who are current on their mortgage payments but who are underwater on their homes.

Such assistance could include refinancing mortgages at lower rates for those homeowners or forgiving some of the principal of their loans.