With so many abandoned and vacant homes on the market, some sellers are hiring companies to place families in their properties in the hopes that doing so will make the house feel less empty and more appealing to buyers. But one woman in Texas says she’s been bitten on the butt by her decision to use a so-called “staging” family.
The homeowner decided to move out of her Dallas-area home before it sold, but says it was her real estate agent who suggested bringing in the temporary family.
“It actually sounded like a fantastic idea,” she told Dallas’ CBS 11 News.
But then she found out the new tenants had brought a dog with them… and parked a truck on the yard… and put a 10-foot tall crucifix on the lawn, which violates HOA rules.
The homeowner contacted the company that had placed the family there and began the process of evicting the tenants, which now included additional family members beyond the two brothers that were supposed to be there.
Unfortunately, while those brothers have moved out, their father has not. And he says he’s not leaving until all appeals have been exhausted.
Police tells CBS 11 that the man is allowed to stay on the property until the courts say he can’t.
But that means that the homeowner — even though she’s continuing to pay the mortgage, insurance and HOA fees — “can’t go onto my [own] property. There’s nothing I can do to that property to really reclaim it or save it from these people who have really taken it hostage.”
And it’s not just the homeowner who is persona non grata in her house. A real estate agent recently tried to show the house to an interested buyer but was told the house was occupied.
She says she’s no longer comfortable having agents show the house, and even brought a police escort with her when she went to get her For Sale sign back from the front lawn.
The company that placed the brothers in the house says it pre-screens all tenants.
“With regard to whether we put the wrong people into the house, the people who are on the lease I don’t think are bad people,” a company rep tells CBS 11. “I think people outside of the tenants we put in that property are the ones causing the problems.”
Legal Dilemma: Man’s Castle Or Woman’s Home? [CBS News 11]
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In my libertarian utopia, the owner would just walk in there with a gun and say ‘gtf off my property or your a dead man”
There’s something to be said for a strong libertarian respect of property rights.
I honestly thought that nothing I read on the Internet or in the news would ever surprise me again, but this…this really surprises me. I’m a fan of the idea the commenter who suggested changing the locks had. Stake out the house, change the locks, call the police when the douche bag tries to get in. Either that, or shut off all utilities. Or maybe hire workers to do construction on the house every day as early as possible? Really loud construction.
This one of just a few cases where “Stand Your Ground” type law would be fine with me.
An earlier poster here, jza1218, had it just about perfect but I would add.
Put old man in big odor-proof bag and place in random dumpster on another
property in the neighborhood.
Oh I almost forgot, make the two Jesus-freak brothers pay the owner to have
the locks changed on everything and activate 24×7 private spies under control
of the realtor until sells.
Then shot brothers as well and send vicious pit bull to cooperative meat packing
plant. Also need to somehow put contracts out on CastleKeepers personnel all the
way to the top since their obvious goal is to put ignorant hicks in control of properties
that aren’t theirs as a reaction to the housing crisis.
Some real estate agents I worked with years ago tried this… They’re short-term tenants, usually not screened very well, and the real estate agent is often getting kickbacks you don’t know about. It could also be rented out to a corporation for their employees that the real estate agent doesn’t know about or isn’t aware of. Another possibility is subletting.
I still say the easiest house to sell is one that is empty and spotlessly clean except for light fixtures and plain blinds and some appliances.
I work in real estate and most people think something like this couldn’t ever happen but guess what due to our laws to protect women laws favoring tenant or rather occupants have been stregenthed.
Basically this is a feminist provision to protect female occupants. Laws where changed because women who move in with their boyfriend and she is not on the lease if they break up he could kick her out. All the occupant laws in the U.S were rewritten to favor occupants who are out out.
If you rent and allow someone to stay with you who is not on the lease after a certain short period of time you can’t just call the police and kick them out. You have to evict them and if your a female you can have the actually tenant kicked out until the occupant has been evicted.
It’s funny how this worked in reverse in this situation.
Oh there’s a LEASE? Well that’s just stupid. I thought she was paying them a small fee to put on a good show and let them stay there gratis. That would have made them employees not tenants.
You force your way in, armed of course and shoot the person. You are protected under Castle Law as you are defending property that you can prove you legally own. Done.
That is one God-awful ugly house.
Reading more of the story on the linked article shows how screwed up this country has gotten. I have no problem with someone trying to make a mouse feel lived-in, it give you an idea of what can fit into a place. The fact that this guy, an invited guest of the tenants, can stay even though the original tenants were evicted is asinine. And judging by the what he has done and said, I bet he will try to appeal anything to the supreme court.
Meet the Joneses
That dog dose not look terribly vicious, and the crosses were being manufactured obviously, if you watch the clip…just what I got from the video.
She got herself into this one by “renting”…and she will have to go through normal “rental procedure” to get out. People should know this is what can happen if you rent, for any reason.