The frau and I have been in the process of buying another home just down the street from here... we wanted to get something for each of the kids, and give them a foot up while we were both still breathing air... Well... Yesterday, I go over to the houses and there is a camper in the back yard with the gate lock is missing and it is now secured with a board screwed into the doors to make it not open... as I am taking down the information to call the bank and the tow truck for the camper, a fella pulls up in a car and says... "Who are you"... I tell him, I am the owner of the property and I have a camper I am going to have towed out of my yard... the guy says "well you shouldn't do that because I let her in and told her she can stay there since no-one is living in the house". I look at this fool and then tell him, I have paid thousands of dollars to the bank for this place and they wont let me into the place to fix it up until escrow closes, you think I'm going to let you put someone, anyone, in my new place if I can get in there... you've got until the morning to get it out of there, or I'm going to tow it out into the street and have it impounded for damages to the property. The fella then says that the woman is down on her luck and needs to have someone give her a break... Like I get to just have any swinging dork say what can go on my property... Anyways, I called the broker, and the note-holder, and told them what I found, they said tomorrow they will send out someone to pull the camper out of the yard, and re-secure the property... I drive by the place after work today, and the camper is gone, but the gates aren't going to stay closed now... I have to repair that in a few minutes... lucky for me, I have a few extra hasps and some locks to try to do that... Any of you have squatters all of a sudden show up like they owned the place...
No, but that sucks. Our next door neighbor seems to be taking in "guests"... for awhile, it was just one other old guy, wandering the neighborhood and smoking. Now, there's a woman, as well, who sits on the porch most of the time, crying some of the time. It's getting weird.
A few cases have gone far beyond that, to the point of squatters or their accomplices drawing up bogus 'legal' papers that threw the sheriff off track for a day until things could be investigated and verified. One couple in this region, returning from a long vacation, had to stay in a hotel for a bit until the new 'deed' was verified as a fraud.
I'm curious, who is this guy that let her in and what authority did he have to decide that? Furthermore, if he felt that strongly about helping her he should had offered space in his property. Luis
Ain't that the truth... The fella said he was the neighbor that lives behind the house on the next street... His address he gave me was for a house behind the property, but still, like you said, why didn't he offer HIS place up... My first impression was they are tweekers... But I have been mistaken before, I've been married 3 times, so some of my decision making processes must not be always fully functional.
I've never had squatters, even when I left my home unattended for several months, my first semester in Mexico. But nobody wants to go 30 miles outside Fargo in the dead of winter to squat in an old farmhouse. I did have the occasional camper in my yard, as I was on a popular bicycle route through North Dakota. They would stop and ask for water, and I'd invite them to use the bathroom, and set up camp in the yard if they liked. I thought it was cool that people would bicycle all the way across the country. But invited guests are a far cry from squatters.
ound: A lady stopped by our yard sale last year and was telling us about how some homeless people set up camp on their property. I think she allowed them to stay for a while because they were well away from the house - I think they have an acre of land or two. We have sometimes noticed that people have been looking inside our little camping trailer and speculated that we might find someone in there someday. We don't bother to lock it anymore because there isn't anything worth stealing from it. It would be more of a pain if someone broke into it.
"...until escrow closes..." Do you have any legal authority to do anything except report it to the people you are buying it from before you close?
No... but since the bank DOES have several thousand dollars of mine for the place right now, and it IS vacant, and the note holder is out of town (San Fran BofA) if I don't take action, they could set themselves up in there and it would take eviction to get them out... I ain't going to play that... and now that they are out of there... I don't have that to worry about right now.
there was a guy on the news last year who took it upon himself to move homeless people into all the foreclosed properties in a devastated part of florida. claimed it was good for the homeless and good for the bank to have someone living there. he would help them break in and set up shop. i think it was 60 minutes.
I think I recall that program too... Damn scary to think someone without any means can just be installed into someone's property because of a temporarily empty house
The REALLY sly ones run ads in craigslist . . . getting a year's lease from some poor slob and their family. Then the renters (after a long process of getting them evicted) are out the rent money, and no one knows where the fake deed holder went.
And then there is the Japanese billionaire putting homeless into his multiple homes in one of the most expensive neighbors on Oahu. Tycoon's Kahala 'Mission' a neighborhood eyesore | The Honolulu Advertiser | Hawaii's Newspaper I think he is finally selling some of the properties.
Squatters are scum. There are thousands of empty run down properties here, in the US, in Ireland, yet they only seem interested in 'squatting' in the nice, already owned houses. Funny that. There's two ways of dealing with squatters. The legal way and the erm, other way. I remember in the taxi job being given a card by a rather large gentleman who was a debt collector. The card read along the lines of "ACME Debt Collectors; We don't screw about"! I think a call to those guys would sort your squatter problem
You are lucky if you get rid of them. I believe they have "rights" in certain states. I recall a story where a family went overseas for a year and the neighbors observed people setting up shop in thier house. They called the police but since the owner wasn't present they couldn't kick them out. Then when the family came back, they had to go through a lengthy process of proving they owned the house and didn't allow the squatters in. I should find the link. Terribly frustrating story to read.
This thread is 3 1/2 years old guys, it only got reawakened by a spammer whose post has been deleted. Just throwing that out there, don't know if cabbie noticed that when he posted...
WOW... talk about a resurrection... The good news is... that is all history... I get $900 a month like clockwork now... and that note is only $235... that house will be paid off in 2 more years, and then there will only be two owners - my frau and I, and the State.
