However, Federal statistics show that although banks are making plenty of offers, only few of those loan changes are being made permanent — of the more than 1 million homeowners who have started the required three-month trial period, only 116,000 have had their new terms made permanent.

The complaints have a common tune. Homeowners say the banks are giving them the runaround — either by pledging to modify loans and then not following through or by signing them up for the trial period and then leaving them in limbo.

“This is an epidemic problem,” said Stuart Rossman, director of litigation with the National Consumer Law Center.

Under the terms of the Treasury Department program, participating banks that offer new loan terms are supposed to put homeowners through a three-month trial period. If the homeowners make timely payments and meet other conditions, the terms are supposed to become permanent.

Rossman, who is helping to represent the plaintiffs, said banks — in Massachusetts and across the country — are stringing homeowners along for months without sealing the deal.

“That, to us, is inexcusable and a breach of contract,” he said. “They are living in limbo while they are at risk of losing their home.”

In the Massachusetts cases, the lawsuits describe a Kafkaesque scenario in which the banks have been holding up the loan terms because of missing paperwork that they either won’t identify or never required in the first place.

Mark Lawson, an attorney with the Legal Aid Society of Southwest Ohio representing the plaintiffs in the Ohio federal case, said loan modification problems are widespread.

“It’s pretty much everywhere,” he said.