Musings

Absentee Landlords from Hell...the bank as your neighbor.

As a real estate practitioner, I see many different sides of our society, from posh mansions to modest cottages, from large and elegant farms to efficiency condos and coops. Lately, however, in pursuit of a modest single family home for some dear friends and clients, I have encountered some curious offerings, ostensibly presented by grown up and mature human beings, but showing signs of massive dysfunction.

One house, with a bonus to the selling agent, had mold that would make a normally non-allergic person recoil with disgust...he forgot to mention that there was mold on the walls in the basement after the house had endured a year of vacancy and water penetration. It was almost enough mold to quality for an exhibit like the cockroach exhibit at the Smithsonian, you know the one I mean, where the owner sprayed a massive gathering of cockroaches over his kitchen counters and cupboards.

On another one, there was a small inset pond in the deck in the read yard full of rain water and some dead animals.

In yet another, there was leaking water from a cracked pipe, in a house that stank of dampness and mold and water penetration from the outside.

We are told that the banks are in trouble and we're very sorry to hear that. We are also sorry that they are so preoccupied that they can't come by their property from time to time and keep it from being a nuisance and neighborhood bring-down that it is. For this we are not sorry for the banks, any more than we would be sorry for degenerates who let their homes degenerate to the point of rats, vermin and other social malefaction.

No kidding. We are sorry that the banks overextended themselves and tried to make too much money at the expense of common sense. But it looks like the bonuses and windfalls stimulus money have not done much for the sense of the community we all might have hoped for. These conditions stink and are an embarrassment for us all. I am sure we can do better than this.

- Tim (7-26-2009)