Here is a cheap house in California

Yeesh!

I thought I read somewhere that selling a property in California makes it easier to remove someone trespassing or squatting because the new owner had no previous involvement with the squatter/trespasser.  This was a way to get around all the hoops someone has to go thru to evict people.

I could be totally wrong but I swear I read this was the new way of doing things.

I wonder if it is a renter or even the old owner who lost the house that is living there. If the new owner can get them out, it looks like houses in the area are going for at almost twice what the asking price is. Good luck!

Yeah, the house is listed for around half the price of the rest of the neighborhood so it could be a great deal, depending on whether the occupant has destroyed the interior out of spite before being forcibly removed. Obviously someone died without leaving a will and I can imagine that the occupant thought the house should go to them.

I have witnesses two homes that were occupied by a hostile person that refused to move out and it was not pretty. The first one belonged to my cousin, purchased entirely by her after her divorce. She met and married a new guy, and fortunately she had experienced enough in her divorce that she had this new husband sign a prenup. She thought she was covered. They lived in the house together for several years and ultimately decided to divorce. He refused to move out. The house was in her name only and the prenup covered her with language that if they divorced, it would in no way be a component of shared property eligible to be split. He had signed it, but he now didn’t care.

My cousin worked and made sure she paid all house payments out of her checking account so she was again covered with proof that the house was hers alone. When told by his attorney that he didn’t have a snowball’s chance to lay claim to the home, he was livid. He got violent and she grabbed her two kids and ran. Police were called, but he wasn’t arrested or removed. She was too scared to move her kids back into the house. She filed for the divorce and since the on,y thing they purchased together was a boat, and the children were not his, it should have been a quick and easy process. She even decided to give up her half ownership in the boat thinking he would take it and run.

During all of this time, she was never able to get back into the house. She was staying with her sister several miles away and was in touch with her neighbors who were watching the house to see when he left the house so she could return and at least grab clothing for the three of them and a few other critical items. She had left with just her purse and the kids. He didn’t leave. She called his workplace and learned they had fired him for not coming in. I guess he thought if he just stayed in the house, he would get it?

After she was fully divorced and had the paperwork to have the police throw his ass out, she and the kids went inside. He had destroyed the house. He put cement in the pool and down every sink, toilet, and bathtub except for the master that he was using. He poured oil all over the carpeting. He sprayed something like Roundup on all of the landscaping, killing everything. The walls all had horrible threats written on them and all kinds of false accusations, even in her children’s bedrooms. There were holes punched in the walls also which she guessed were from a hammer.

He had cut up all of their clothing which she said must have taken him forever because there was just a pile of strips of cloth on the floor when she opened the closet doors. He had burned all of her photos, leaving just little corners of them so that she knew what the pile of ashes had once been. There was rotted food all over and he had done something somewhere that made the house smell horrible. Oh, and he urinated in all the corners of every room. It was just a complete disaster. It took years for her to get the house rebuilt to where she and the kids could move back in. She put up all kinds of security cameras and motion detectors. She also had a restraining order, but we know how effective those are in protecting someone. She never married again and she never talked about anyone, so I doubt if she ever even dated.

The other house was the one my sister and her husband bought. It was a very expensive large home in a great neighborhood. The husband, a doctor, had left her and their children to run off with a nurse. He apparently just wanted his half of the proceeds from the sale of the house and that was it. The wife was livid and did things to keep the house from selling, but nowhere near as bad as my cousin’s home. My sister said she was going to repaint the interior and change the carpeting anyway, so she didn’t care that this woman had spray painted things all over. And fortunately she didn’t harm the pool or any of the landscaping. In comparison, it was all just superficial damage, but it allowed my sister to get a great price on the house. And that obviously gave the ex wife less money in the settlement. Her husband wasn’t bothered at all.

Ha, that is a duplicate of the house I grew up in, down to the decorative stones on the front. Probably the same model (I grew up in the central valley so probably actually). I would not buy a home with built-in trouble like that—who knows how long the legal process will take.

That was one sick person to do that much to a house. I have heard of doing damage but that was beyond. To cut up their clothes and to burn photos but preserve the corners. That is a lot of hate. Not yo mention the rest of the damage. Crazy nut job.

Unless the home is a total loss, completely demolishing a house is not common here. There are tax consequences to completely tearing down a house and rebuilding. Most times, people will leave a part of the older home up and build around it. It is then considered a remodel not a rebuild. Also, this house is not out of place in the neighborhood, based on the photos of comps. And if they do decide to tear it down, the demolition crew cannot tear down a building if someone is inside. So, it will still be a waiting game. 

Oh right, I had no idea about the tax implications there. We watch a lot of renovation shows, and I am always surprised when they take a house right down to the bare bones (especially Good Bones!) - I always say to DSO "Wouldn't it be cheaper and easier just to demolish and build a brand new house?" Now I know why. Well, that, and the fact that a TV show about building a new house is not as interesting haha!

It's becoming more and more common here to demolish houses. In the court / cul de sac where I grew up, two houses have been demolished and brand new houses built in their place. The houses were built in the late 60s, and even though they are solid brick and not close to falling down, they are very much out of date. The house across the road from my childhood home sold for $660k back in 2011, and they recently demolished and rebuilt. Another house at the top of the court sold for $1.1 million in 2020, and they demolished and rebuilt - insanity!! Imagine paying over one million for a block of land!

The suburb where I live now was built in 1985, and already there are a few houses that have been demolished and rebuilt. 

There are tons of old houses! It depends on the suburb. I absolutely LOVE ❤️ old Victorian or Edwardian houses, and would most likely choose an older (renovated) house over an ultra modern house in an inner city or bayside suburb - if I could afford to buy there. 

I think people prefer to renovate OLD old houses, but are happy to demolish NEW old houses, if that makes sense! Like, a house built in the 60s is old, but not in a charming way. Just in an ugly and impractical way. 

It is pretty common around here especially closer to downtown Denver.. .you can drive through old neighborhoods and see so many types of homes from originals to great big new ones.  There is an area especially around Cherry Creek (Denver) where this happens all the time.