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After Forts received a foreclosure warning in October, Brennan connected her with Genie McGee, a reverse-mortgage specialist with Financial Freedom Senior Funding Corp., an Irvine, Calif., unit of IndyMac Bancorp Inc. She determined that Forts would qualify for a reverse mortgage of about $61,000.

Brennan sent Fremont's loss-mitigation department a letter proposing that the company agree to take that sum and cancel its plans to foreclose on the house. On Dec. 3, the day before the foreclosure sale was supposed to take place, Fremont agreed to the deal and stopped the foreclosure.

The transaction illustrates one of the biggest challenges in getting lenders to accept payouts from reverse mortgages: taking less money than the house may be worth. In the 14 cases Brennan has settled to date, lenders have accepted payments for an average of 65 cents on the dollar. read more