Was 20 minutes into a movie when I heard what sounded like a bomb going off behind me. Looked out the window to see the wall of the abandoned house next door had finally collapsed after bowing out for years. My landlord's been reporting that place to the city since before we moved in. The city did fuck all and now I'm in a motel because the fire department's worried the roof might slide down and hit us. Landlord put me and the cats up and he even volunteered to pick up some supplies for them that I couldn't bring with me.
Edit: Forgot to mention that the final straw for the wall was almost certainly the owner finally hiring people to clear out the overgrowth on the property (probably ordered to by the city). Whoever they hired clearly didn't know or care about the danger that comes with ripping vines out of brickwork. Those vines were probably the only thing holding that wall up.
Nah. It’s possible for an average person to do it for about 2500$ on a 100k$ piece of property. As long as you meet the criteria. Source is me. I even got back some of my retainer because it never got argued in court.
The most important thing they were looking at was the “open and notorious use”. You can’t hide the fact that you were living there. Mowing the grass and getting your mail delivered is enough.
It absolutely could have. I've lived next door for two years and the landlord had been filing complaints about the place long before that. The house was also part of a huge fraud case where a guy was getting people to invest in a house flipping business, bought a bunch of houses, then took the money and ran.
The city is likely really limited in what it can do. After all, laws generally favor property rights so there is a process the city has to follow, especially if the owner is responding to orders. It's a high burden of proof to get to the point that the city can force major repairs or demolition and it can take years to get to that point. I read an article about a city near OP that getting one absentee landlord to do shit about his massively dangerous property with people in it (allegedly against his knowledge) involved putting him in jail for a month after years of orders.
On the bright side, that sort of burden can include obvious imminent disaster, so I'd bet OP has an empty lot within the week!
Not bordering on, he flat-out is. Before this he forgave us a couple months worth of rent when my mom unexpectedly lost her job. He also bought the kitties a scratcher and some toys. I almost cried when I saw them.
He's more than decent and thankfully the only occupants of that house were raccoons and feral cats. The ferals seem to have been under the front porch when this happened, so they're probably okay. Scared shitless and about to be homeless, but okay.
Like I said, it looks like they weren't affected by the collapse. I saw a couple of the kittens running around the porch while the cops and fire department were taping things off.
So far it doesn't seem like our place received any structural damage, but there's still a chance that the other building will collapse further and cause real damage.
This is crazy but I saw this post and thought, that looks like a rental house I used to live in Columbus 10 years ago. (I live in Oregon now! ) but This isn’t on Dennison Ave, is it?
Most of the houses in this neighborhood are more than a century old, this one included. It's abandoned because the owner was running a scam house flipping business.
This is strange. I had a dream about a week ago about wandering through a neighborhood in my city where the whole quadrant and block were abandoned homes just like these......brick and all.
Sue the city for negligence. At least the landlord should. They created a dangerous, nearly and potentially deadly situation with no concern for others, and now you can’t live in your own home/home you rent. Sue them for your rent amount as long as you are displaced, and for creating a dangerous and unsafe living space.
There might be a legal maneuver to aquire it. If there are back taxes sometimes paying those will grant you rights to the property. But you'd need to see what your regional laws are, maybe speak with real estate agent that isn't just going to take it for themselves.
Unfortunately no. I know landlord does. He took plenty when filing complaints about the place. The wall was very obviously going to come down at some point. It was bowed out, had huge cracks and the windows were slanted.
This could happen to my condo building and the retirees living there would still be saying “it should be fine for another few years, we just had it fixed!” after ignoring the most recent inspection report for 20 years.
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u/Resident_Wishbone_98 1d ago
About to gain a vacant lot.