my mortgage and US Bank

I'm not thrilled with US Bank as the holder of my house mortgage. I wish I knew a local small bank or credit union that held mortgages directly. I checked with my credit union (of nearly a decade), but they refer those contracts to another company.  I didn't originally get it through US Bank, but the realtor company that helped me with the process sold it after only a few months (which is apparently a normal thing that happens) to US Bank.

I intend to overpay my mortgage every month.

1. I think that money gets applied to the principal, but I can't tell for sure. "US Bank Home Mortgage" is in the habit of sending me a check occasionally for mortgage escrow overage amounts. I just want it applied to the principal. I don't want that money back.
    
2. I tried to cash one of those checks about 2 weeks ago, and the teller at my credit union appropriately refused to deposit it after noticing that the check was dated 2018 instead of 2019. Huh? I don't think think it was sitting around my house that long, but I do have a habit of losing stuff like this.
    
3. I went immediately from the credit union to my local US Bank office. They said they couldn't help me. I needed to call the phone number on the check.  *sigh*  Okay.
    
4. I drove home then called the bank to inquire. The automated teller said that my current balance was in the negative. Huh?! That's the first thing I asked the customer service representative. I was told that total might have been the momentary balance, but he was showing a positive amount which sounded more like the dollar figure that I was expecting. Good. The rep said that, yes, he could apply that 2018-dated check directly to the principal of my loan. Perfect! That's what I wanted to happen all along anyway.
    
5. Then... today... a check shows up in my mailbox. Yep, it's that same overage check again. At least it has the correct date this time, so I'll just go deposit it then try to apply it online directly to my mortgage.

I logged into US Bank online today, and it still says that I've selected to overpay toward my principal more than $100/month. I increased the dollar amount to $150 exactly and saved it. Hopefully it will "stick" and work as I intended.

The website did note that this weekend they are converting everything from the mortgage website to the main US Bank website.  Hopefully that system change is what's responsible for this current nonsense, and everything will straighten itself out in the coming weeks. Meanwhile, I confirmed the following figures:

• I have consistently paid more annually on the principal (but only by a miniscule amount) than the interest.
• My current principal balance is about $45.5K, down from the original $53.5K a few years ago.
• For comparison, I've earned about $34K/year in wages (pre-tax, pre-insurance, pre-everything) during the same timeframe as my mortgage.

It's good to see progress, but it still seems like I'm 30 years away from finishing that 30-year loan. I wish I could easily give those interest payments to a better (read: more community-responsible and minority-friendly) institution than US Bank.