Buying A House: C or D?

We have a lawyer who does RE in the family and we know where the (clean) title is. It’s vacant except for an inspection and clear out. It’s also not a pressing thing so we can really cross our T’s, etc.

My question is probably not really for this room bc it was more for people who had real-world experience w doing BOTH traditional and foreclosure/auction/alternative means of acquisition

I’ve talked to a few people who have done both, including a guy at the bar this week. He was apparently one of my former neighbors but we hadn’t met.

He and his wife actually lived on the corner, and the house next door was foreclosed on. They were afraid it’d wreck the market, because they were going to sell within a couple years and it was a dump. They bought from either the bank or the state and it was completely normal, but I didn’t hear whether they used a realtor or just real estate attorney.

kinder - just guided by my solicitor. ofc it means we probably had to pay a little more than we would have, had we been proceedable but that’s fine. mortgage appointment and listing all locked in for early next week so all go. lots of work required on new place so need to start thinking about that too. scary/exciting

so today my neighbor's adult son, who is a handyman by trade and cleans his folks' yard every week, tells us that he believe's he's owed compensation for cleaning up leaf litter from the trees on my property that share a boundary with theirs. there are several trees and they drop a fair amount of debris, but nothing harmful to their property by what I understand to be the law in this kind of situation. They're not the friendliest people in the world, so this feels an awful lot like a shakedown. What am i supposed to do, pay him every week to keep his own yard clean?

middle finger

yeah that's horseshit

we've been there for 7 years - what's he want, back pay? I'm not playing.

He can believe whatever he wants yknow

It might depend on the state, but I don't think you'd even have to pay if a branch from a tree on your property fell on his car parked in his driveway.

I mean, it'd be weird to have let that situation develop for so long in the first place, but

lmao at this guy

tree motional labour

about 5 years ago the top half of the loquat tree in my front yard (a tree that should never have been planted, and was too big at the time) came down in their front yard and blocked their entry but did no damage to their house or property. I was mortified, and left work immediately to come home and deal with it. The son came over and said "I'll get it out of here". But I was so determined to make the situation right I cut all of the branches and broke it all down until it was in a manageable, albeit large, pile completely on my property.

The guy came back a couple of hours later, was surprised by what I did, but hauled it away with a buddy. Then he came back and charged me $400.

I balked, and he said he went and got labor, there was the truck, the dump fee etc. Obviously I knew he was bullshitting me on this absurd charge but I was so terrified of their disapproval or the potential that they would somehow claim other damage, I endeded up paying him $300 just to make the family happy. Apparently they have been in talks since that time.

It might depend on the state, but I don't think you'd even have to pay if a branch from a tree on your property fell on his car parked in his driveway.

Yeah, I was kinda surprised to learn that, in Georgia, if a tree on an adjacent property falls and lands all across your yard, YOU are responsible for the costs of removal. That seems bonkers, but it's apparently pretty difficult to contest.

An extreme version would be a tornado blowing somebody's tree through your front door. You couldn't sue your neighbor a block away for that.

That's an "Act of God" or whatever, sure. But aren't they all.

with jackasses like this it might actually be the way to go. instead of trying to reason with them or attempt to be friendly - neither of which they seem interested in - you could go straight in with the law. "i hear what you're saying but the law in this county says (x). if your leaves fell in my yard i'd be responsible for it. sorry buddy!" i wouldn't even get into specifics about the ridiculous demand for retroactive payment.

seems otm to me

its nice to have easy neighbours for everything else there's "sorry we cant agree, whats the law fuckface?"

I've got the opposite thing happening: Two of my neighbors so far have built fences without asking to go halvsies. One of them even built his new fence in front of the old fence which has created this six-inch DMZ area of weeds on our property line.

I wouldn't have minded paying half, but now, I'm just kicking back to see if the neighbor on the corner is going to build a new fence on his own or should I really go out there and fix that broken plank.

man i hear that six-inch DMZ of weeds is the only version to have

tells us that he believes he's owed compensation for cleaning up leaf litter from the trees on my property

Is there a homeowner's association that requires everyone in your association to clean up leaf litter in their yards? A town council? If so, then I'd inquire of the officers of the HOA or town council if there's some precedent for neighbors owing this kind of compensation. Otherwise, that leaf clean-up sounds voluntary on the part of your unfriendly neighbors and I'd bet you have no legal obligation to pay for it.

The other consideration is whether you think those neighbors are just jerks who'll never be converted to friendly, cooperative neighbors. If they seem past hope, be polite, but refuse. If they seem reachable, talk it over with them, not their freaking adult son. They're the ones who live there. They're your neighbors, not him. He's the hired help.

That's a shakedown. I lived across the street from a park for over 8 years and would have to clear leaves that blew into my yard/driveway every single day during the autumn so it wouldn't clog up drains. That would've been hilarious if I had tried to charge the city for my time.

If he asks again just say that the parents can swing by if they feel like there are an excessive amount of leaves they need help with between the son's visits.

yea this is total bullshit

just research the laws in your area and tell him what it says

I’m delighted to have the backing of the ilx council on civic relations, property issues subcommittee. Thanks all.

That is such a scam that he's running. It's the same when random strangers on the street provide you or your car a service without asking if you even want it and then demand money.

Neighbor: Hey, I raked my own yard.

You: I see. Looks nice.

Neighbor: That'll be $50.

I wonder if he rakes all the leaves, then sorts them into “ours” and “theirs” piles & stores them plastic shopping bags just waiting for his day in court when he can march in the leaf bags like Miracle on 34th St etc

omg

stock portfoliage

lol

I wonder if he rakes all the leaves, then sorts them into “ours” and “theirs” piles & stores them plastic shopping bags just waiting for his day in court when he can march in the leaf bags like Miracle on 34th St etc

Not quite but he has filled my compost bin a few times... without permission of course.

In the summer, your neighbor is probably receiving free shade from a tree that is on your property. Send him a bill for that.

In most jurisdictions, whatever falls in your yard is your problem, no matter whose property it came from.

It gets slightly more interesting when you have (as we have) trees that are exactly on the property line. We had a property-line tree fall down recently. Though its trunk had been 90% in my yard, it was still shared, legally speaking. When it fell, it was almost all in my neighbor's yard (having missed his house by inches). I was expecting him to be a dick about it, but miraculously he paid for the entire removal. I paid to rebuild the fence and it was all quite amicable.

My neighbor's peach and apple tree used to hang over the fence into my driveway. The fruit would drop off into the raised garden, rot and attract all sort of crap. THIS IS LIFE. We also used to have to duck our heads under the fruit bearing branches sometimes when leaving the house. I asked the neighbor if he could cut it back instead of, you know, being a jerk and cutting it myself and then charging him. The son sounds like work is slow and he's scrounging up money or is just annoyed about having to maintain the yard anyway.

they probably sit there and stew about it, ginning up the injustice of it all

Sparkle Motion's neighbor's son seems to have some sort of bizarre grift going on, but he's not very good at it

Yeah, the $400 reduced to $300 charge above is telling. He and his friend (labor) likely illegally dumped the wood or gave it away. It's beginner mobster business to tell/discuss with someone the fee after you've done the work.

"I'll take care of it" followed by charging you means that he was not, in fact, taking care of it imo

listed our place. gangbusters with viewings. mortgage approved. all moving pretty fast 😬

so the son came over and talked to me directly (he had previously run this whole scheme past my wife prior) and told me that my trees were my responsibility, and I need to make it right with his family. As soon as I balked he started to get angry so I'm saying things like "look I want to be good neighbors here but that's not how it works at all."

"well if you want to be a good neighbor then you need to show me a good faith love offering, or you can bring your own crew over here every four months to clean out my mother's gutters, because she shouldn't have to"

"she doesn't have to. you don't have to pick up anything out of your backyard, man."

"that's right, because it's your tree and your responsibility"

"I'm not paying you to clean your own yard"

and on and on it went until we both walked away shaking our heads. good god. I'm going to ignore the whole thing and see what happens.

Did he really say "good faith love offering"? Are you the sole owner of trees in the neighborhood?

“Good faith offering”, “love offering” and “neighborly contribution” were all phrases he employed.

“If these trees weren’t here my mother’s gutters wouldn’t be clogged”

“If there were no trees anywhere no one would have to pick up any leaves”

“I’m not talking about all trees, I’m talking about your trees”

and so on

I had a neighbor who on the first day I moved in, warned me not to park on the street in front of my own house.

Our street was on an incline. He said that whenever a car was parked there, and it rained, the water would wash down the curb, hit the tire, and somehow ramp out of the curb and into the next yard below mine. Making a mess, I guess, since that yard was already downhill from the street.

I told him I'd keep an eye on it as a courtesy, but hey, the only thing more public than he street was the rain itself.

I didn't need to park on the street anyway because I had my own driveway,. But at least twice, he or his wife asked friends who were visiting to move their cars. Once, I came home at two in the morning with a friend who had parked her car there. Yeah, it was raining. As we got out, through the darkness and the rain, I could hear the dude yelling from his porch, "Ahhhh, see what it's doing?"

Go sue the Lord, dude, I wanted to tell him.

xpost I don't know which subreddit the tree controversy belongs in but I feel like it wouldn't be out of place on the Choosing Beggars one. He's trying to appeal to you being a good guy and wearing you down. He should do a forensic analysis of everything stuck in his mom's gutter.

I would happily call bullshit on his claims of cleaning her gutters even twice yearly. In 7 years I have never seen the guy on a ladder for any reason.

thinking about this tree son vexes me

you should definitely come up with things to charge him for, though. does your tree shade the neighbor’s house at all? charge for the savings on air conditioning they’re realizing in the summer.

I have a beautiful Japanese maple in the backyard that he acknowledges is “cool, because it gives shade”. I did not seize the opportunity to hand him an invoice.

good god. i am so sorry you have to deal with this twerp.

though it does sound like these phrases he's using, like "good faith offering" or what the fuck ever, mean that he understands the law isn't on his side. he's probably looked it up during one of his family stewing-in-it sessions.