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PaperclipPerfector  1d ago (text post)   1043 thread views

Friday Fun Thread for May 30, 2025

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Court opinion:

  • In year 2012, Michael dies. His two sons, Dennis and Roman, don't bother to probate his will, so Michael's house remains titled in Michael's name. Dennis is left in charge of maintaining the house.

  • In year 2017, the property taxes on the house are not paid. In year 2018, a company spends 7 k$ to buy from the municipal government the right to foreclose on the house.

  • In year 2021, the company starts a foreclosure proceeding against Michael, and serves Dennis with the complaint. Nobody responds to the complaint in court, so in year 2022 the judge declares Michael to have defaulted, and the company successfully forecloses on the house by paying off the delinquent taxes of 55 k$. In year 2023, the company sells the house to a third party for 325 k$, yielding profit of 270 k$.

  • Just a few days before the sale, Roman learns that the house has been foreclosed on. Months after the sale, a year after the foreclosure, and 11 years after Michael's death, Roman finally probates Michael's will, is appointed the administrator of Michael's estate, and in that capacity moves to (1) vacate the foreclosure because he had no notice of it and (2) recoup the 270 k$ of profit under the recent federal Supreme Court decision forbidding the "theft" through foreclosure of home equity in excess of the delinquent taxes.

  • The trial judge denies the motion, and in year 2025 the appeals panel affirms. Service of the complaint on Dennis, who resided at the house, was proper. And the Supreme Court decision prohibiting "home-equity theft" is not retroactive.

Man, that really sucks for Dennis.

This case seems like a great metaphor for America these days: Everyone (but Dennis) did everything by the book, and the court seems to have made the right decision based on the facts, but no one had the decency to knock on Dennis's door a couple of times and let him know of his impending legal doom because he didn't check all the right boxes in the right forms.

Life in America sucks for people who can't / won't jump through legal hoops. Basically everyone I know who is on-again-off-again-homeless has a story like this about how the system fucked them over. But the Man oppressing them is just "doing the right thing by the book". I'm sure there were other problems in the 1800s, but at least the downtrodden/not-quite-dregs of society didn't have to deal with paperwork.

If you read the complaint, it sounds like they did exactly that, considering Dennis was served a foreclosure notice in person. I'd assume he got a heckuva a lot of deliquency notices too given that he lived at the address in question. It's right in the middle of page 3. Haven't read the full thing, but I can't say I'm feeling very sympathetic, it sounds like Dennis received repeated notices over the course of 12 years and just ignored them. They were probably addressed to his Dad, but you really should read any correspondence from the government addressed to your dead dad if you want to keep his house.

The only thing I can think of here is to serve the house with info on the delinquent taxes before foreclosing. If that were done, I would have no sympathy whatsoever for the sons (Dennis certainly).

They got served! They know that taxes are a thing! And they did nothing at all about it. For ten years. Did they think they were just getting away with it?

I get that paperwork sucks. What was the alternative? That people can just avoid paying taxes because they’re too lazy or ignorant to do it? To increase taxes on everyone else to assign a case manager and counsel them very social justicely? To send the landlord’s bailiff around to collect taxes with a bullwhip to handle the delinquent serfs?

The court obviously did the right thing to maintain a functioning society based on existing laws. But it's easy for me to imagine an IQ ~80 person getting sucked into this shitty situation without any intentional malice on their part. IQ 80 corresponds to about 10% of the population. If we can't get a system that is "easy" for these people to navigate, then literally millions of Americans are doomed to a shitty life full of the Man ruining their shit.

In a perfect society, I think that the cops / county clerk / local priest / bartender would have pestered Dennis multiple times in person at their house / church / pub until this got resolved amicably. This pestering would have ultimately saved tax payers tons of money in legal fees as well.

So, just to be clear, you are arguing that ~10% of the population is incapable of performing basic duties towards society and needs to be managed as effective wards of the state with permanent case managers? I know that what you suggested is more of a “my brother’s keeper” model, but everything is atomized now and social mobility is too high, the responsible members of society have successfully escaped their former peers and live in a different suburb. So if they’re coming back, they’re coming as agents of the government, which is trying to collect or control, because that’s what governments do.

I’m not saying this like your solution is unheard of. To a certain extent it’s what we do already, and I guess we hold property owners to a higher standard. But these laws aren’t especially new. Property taxes aren’t new either. People managed before. And how can you really expect someone who can’t manage to regularly pay taxes, to figure out what’s going on in the single most important letter of their life, to attend to all the other maintenance required in owning a house?

(FWIW I don’t read these individuals as too dumb to understand letters, I read them as somewhat lazy and inclined to drag their heels or expect that they’re getting away with things. Very educated people, like college students, can fall into these habits too. I have friends in academia who tell me of students who drag their heels, don’t go through the documents given them, and then panic after the deadlines that they can’t get into the classes they need. This feels like the same pattern: no response to warnings, no response to the official point of no return, but only when their failures become tangible and they can no longer pretend that their inaction has cost them nothing do they try to take action, by complaining that they were never given a fair chance in the first place. And then they go through the right venues, and then they show passion and sophistication, and all those formal barriers are no obstacles to their abilities, and they are oh so very aggrieved. But why not before? Because the issue wasn’t IQ or what have you, it was good practices, and especially the wisdom that wasting time and putting things off and delaying has real costs that add up. As long as nothing tangible is lost, they can lie to themselves that everything is fine, so it’s that moment of losing something real, the sale of the house, that spurs action and also drives these guys berserk because they must confront the fact that they were irresponsible this whole time, and that in particular is too much to bear. So while they are hiring a lawyer and arguing minutiae and appealing to higher courts, their primary argument, or at least sentiment, is that what they were previously asked to do was just too hard, that nobody can reasonably achieve it. And they don’t notice the dissonance. But I do, and I judge them for it.)

You've correctly pointed out a very real failure mode of our modern atomized lifestyle, and highlighted that many people do in fact fail because of their own ineptitude. I agree with all of that but also think it sucks for Dennis that he failed in this way and that it sucks for all of the other people who also fail in this way. Maybe I have too much sympathy for people who suck at modern life.

The only thing I can think of here is to serve the house with info on the delinquent taxes before foreclosing. If that were done, I would have no sympathy whatsoever for the sons (Dennis certainly).

That's what happened in this case. A "pre-foreclosure notice" was sent by both regular mail and certified mail in July 2021, and then the actual foreclosure complaint was served in person in November 2021.

Sorry, I meant before that. Like, yearly automated mail: you’re not paying taxes. If even that was sent, what else could you do but nanny state or feudal bailiff the guy?

Idk about his jurisdiction, but they generally do that? I get a yearly letter even though mine are paid, with my balance and any proposed changes to the tax regime.

The thing that gets me about all this, is that it took a Supreme Court Case to tell the government "No, you can't steal a half million dollar piece of property from someone to satisfy a debt 1/10th of that." And then the shear fucking balls for the government to turn around and go "Ok, well, now we know that... but it doesn't help you"

And then the sheer fucking balls for the government to turn around and go "Okay, well, now we know that... but it doesn't help you."

To be more specific than my summary at the top of this thread:

  • In general:
    • The federal Supreme Court did not mention retroactivity at all in its opinion.
    • The state supreme court has not yet determined one way or the other whether the federal Supreme Court's prohibition of home-equity theft is retroactive—whether fully or only in lawsuits that were still "in the pipeline" when the federal Supreme Court's decision was issued.
  • In this particular case:
    • Roman admitted that full retroactivity would be unworkable, but argued that pipeline retroactivity still should apply.
    • The trial judge pointed out that pipeline retroactivity is not even available in this case, because the foreclosure process had already ended by the time the federal Supreme Court issued the opinion. The appeals panel agreed with this analysis.

So the question of retroactivity technically still is open, at least in this state (New J*rsey).

I mean, I still just think that's bullshit, even with all the caveats? People were getting away with a literal "free money" glitch by buying liens and then repossessing properties for their full value, as opposed to collecting the debt they may have bought for pennies on the dollar, and then paying out the excess of the sale as should have been legally required all along. I'm indifferent on reversing the lien or foreclosure or any of that. Someone "legally" stole almost half a million dollars in equity from these brothers, regardless of how negligent they were. They should be owed the difference between the value of the home and the debt the estate owed, period, no questions asked.

Everyone (but Dennis) did everything by the book

I think Roman can also be blamed for failing to probate the will earlier. If the house's tenancy in common between him and Dennis had been properly reflected on the deed, then presumably the foreclosure complaint would have been served on him as well as on Dennis.

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