I don't think I told you I'll be living at a farm-ette for summer-fall

grasswire

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Mon Jul-20-09 06:23 PM
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I don't think I told you I'll be living at a farm-ette for summer-fall

I just heard from my host that there's a bumper crop of pickling cucumbers coming up fast.

Here's how it happened. My family has been displaced in the foreclosure fuss. We learned several months ago that the landlady had not paid the mortgage since last September and the lender planned to sell the house on the steps of the courthouse. Then we learned that she had 12 properties in foreclosure and had pocketed the rent money on all those homes for all that time.

It was terrible timing for us. And besides, the house is right around the corner from my grandma's old home and the neighborhood just feels right to me. We thought we would try to stay in the house and negotiate with the bank after the sale.

But no. The landlady was intent on evicting all of her tenants in all properties. Just last week four families were ejected from a plex. We called a tenants meeting in May and we have been fighting to stay in the home. We even had to hire a lawyer. But she will not allow people to stay in the homes to deal with the lenders. Why? It's a puzzle. We can only assume that she wants to get cash for keys or strip the houses or something. When we went to court last week, HER own lawyer hadn't even been told the house was in foreclosure.

So we are forced to leave. We won just a few more days and must be out by Thursday. The house will be sold by the bank August 18. She would not return our deposit or allow it to be used as rent, even though she has no material interest left in the house.

She and her husband, a high-profile religious leader here whose LCSW was recently revoked for sleeping with his clients (public record), did this: bought properties on no-down toxic mortgages. They did a little cosmetic work and rented them out. Then they had the homes reappraised and took out more loans based on the new appraisals. Last fall they stopped making mortgage payments on the properties, pocketed all the rent, and are walking away with hundreds of thousands of dollars. Rent skimming is not illegal in this state; it is illegal in California.

The new law signed by Obama does not protect renters whose landlords are greedy enough to evict prior to the foreclosure sale. His law mandates that renters must be allowed by the new owner (or bank) to stay in the house 90 days after the sale. But if the landlord evicts tenants, that doesn't apply.

So.

A family friend who has a farm-ette has offered his apartment over his garage for an extended time. He has been a farmer up until a few years ago and had a CSA, but physically had to give that up. But he has a huge huge garden, and chickens too.

Lots of changes. I'm no longer baking pies, I'm no longer cooking for teenagers (they do graduate!) and will be no longer living in a city neighborhood (at least for now).

Hopefully I'll post some garden pics. That will be a real treat and I hope to learn a lot.

Thanks for letting me rant. :-)