He thought he snagged a Florida villa for $9,100. He got a foot-wide strip of land.

[Demovictory9]

https://www.sun-sentinel.com/local/broward/fl-ne-tax-auction-leaves-buyer-hurting-20190615-d573l2aw7nbk7hgf4y2d36qcoy-story.html



Kerville Holness thought he’d done a great job snapping up a $177,000 Tamarac villa for only $9,100.

But that’s not what he actually bought during a Broward online auction of properties that had defaulted on their taxes.


He got a 1-foot-wide, 100-foot-long strip of land on Northwest 100th Way — valued at $50.

It starts at the curb where two mailboxes have been installed, goes under the wall separating the garages of two adjoining Spring Lake villas, then extends out to the back of the lot.

And officials say he’s stuck with the deal.

So what can Holness do now? Make the people living there get their mailboxes off his grass? Remove the water meters that are in his ground? Maybe try to charge rent to both villas for the joint wall and roof that sit on his land?

“If I’m vindictive enough, I can cut right through the garage wall and the home to get to my air space, but what use would that be to me?” Holness said.


What he wants is for the county to void the deal and give him his money back.

“It’s deception,” said Holness, a first-time auction bidder from Tamarac. “There was no demarcation to show you it’s just a line going through [the villa duplex], even though they have the tools to show that.”

Holness said that property appraiser pictures linked to the auction site showed the villa as being the parcel he was bidding on.


But the appraiser’s site and information on the county’s tax site also show the negligible value of the property, that there is no building value, that the land takes up only 100 square feet and that the property is one-foot wide.

Officials say state law does not allow the refund Holness is seeking.

The message from county officials and real estate experts is that auction participants need to do their homework and make sure they’ve checked for all possible problems a property might have.

https://7news.com.au/business/property/internets-hilarious-suggestions-after-first-home-buyer-accidentally-buys-30cm-strip-of-land-c-168848

Internet's hilarious suggestions after first home-buyer accidentally buys 30cm strip of land

?imwidth=650&impolicy=sevennews_v2

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

1. Textbook case of why people need to read the fine print on everything.

But the appraiser’s site and information on the county’s tax site also show the negligible value of the property, that there is no building value, that the land takes up only 100 square feet and that the property is one-foot wide.

[Sneederbunk]

2. He can use the strip for his Trump signs.

[MichMan]

3. If something seems to good to be true, it probably is..

Thought he was going to score a 177K house for $9100.

[OrwellwasRight]

4. He could charge rent for the mail boxes and garages.

He'd eventually get his $9K back.

Also: FLORIDA!!!!

[Totally Tunsie]

5. LOL, and now he has to mow the damn thing!

[Demovictory9]

6. He has the right to bring a chair and sit on his land. Akward for the home owners though. lol

[SeattleVet]

8. Have to be a pretty narrow chair, though!

[Demovictory9]

9. a stool

[customerserviceguy]

18. Maybe a skateboard! n/t

[LisaL]

23. It doesn't look like he can even put a tent in there, it won't fit.

[LisaL]

22. And pay taxes on it.

I bet poor guy was excited when he thought he got a whole villa for that price. And then it turns out he bought a useless strip of land.

[Aristus]

7. It's not hard to understand how the guy got bilked.

After all, it is the first fraudulent real estate deal in all of Florida's history...

[flvegan]

10. Stuck? Not remotely.

If the article is accurate, and the location of that 1 foot of property can be verified by a survey, neither of the two abutting villa owners can either sell nor mortgage their respective properties without getting at the very least a quit claim deed from Holness. All he has to do is wait it out. Eventually, one (or both) of the other two owners will attempt to sell or mortgage their property and when the title commitment comes back showing the ownership issue, they can simply file a claim on their title policy. Either way, he'll get his money back and then some.

Only real downside is that he'll have to pay taxes on that strip of land, and he has to hope that any declaration of restrictions can't somehow deem him a "unit owner" at which point he'll have HOA dues.

Honestly, if you're going to invest in real property like this, either get a title search done, or at the VERY least, learn to read a legal description. "The NORTHERLY 1 FOOT OF LOT 137..." is pretty clear that you're not getting an entire villa. Yes, that's the actual short legal for this subject property.

Were I currently holding $350k (the abutting units are assessed for around $175k-ish each) worth of real estate hostage on a $9100.00 investment, I'd start listening to offers when they got to $15k.

[SWBTATTReg]

12. If either property on both sides of the 1 foot by 100 foot could even get title insurance...

I'd be surprised that title insurance would be available, after all, I wouldn't mess w/ it if I were a title insurance company (IMHO)...

[flvegan]

15. The current owners of the two parcels

would (hopefully) have each purchased a title insurance policy at the time they bought the property, prior to the tax deed sale, so the insurance part should already be in place.

[Paladin]

13. Sounds like somebody besides me has land title experience.

That 1-foot strip is going to be a blight on the record of those two properties until the matter is legally---and financially---settled.

[flvegan]

16. Yup.

There are a number of possible resolutions here, and they all result in him getting paid.

[SWBTATTReg]

11. How does a property get sized up into a 1 foot by 100 foot parcel anyways? Wierd and ...

I don't really feel sorry for the buyer, other than if something sounds too good to be true, it probably is. If I were the property owner of this one foot strip of land, I would demand that they (the two homes) that they remove structures on his land (although more than likely, there is probably some sort of rule/law against it, although it is Florida, which does have some weird property laws).

[The River]

14. The Land Surveyor

screwed up bigly. Gaps and overlaps should be divided equally between adjoining properties. Creating odd little bits of useless land is bad practice.

[customerserviceguy]

17. That doesn't look like 100 feet long to me

Unless the strip runs under the garage. In that case, somebody screwed up when they platted the land.

I used to be a real estate title searcher/examiner/officer in Washington State, and the only times we saw these "spaghetti farms" was because of a gap in the descriptions of the surrounding tracts. Chances are, a title company is going to write a check to this buyer to pay for the strip of land that got missed somehow.

[Demovictory9]

19. it runs through the garage to the backyard. He owns strip of backyard also

[customerserviceguy]

20. Man, that's a major screw-up

by the title company who did the insurance on the place. They'll be writing a check for this.

[LisaL]

24. Does he own the part of the home that sits on this land?

It's not even two adjacent homes, it one home.
Could he demand that owners remove the parts of the home that sits on his land?

[Demovictory9]

25. he owns the strip of land running through the garages.

[Wounded Bear]

21. Caveat emptor at it's most evil...

[underpants]

26. I know of someone who did that on purpose. A utility easement I think it's called

Land was for sale in the water (Virginia peninsula) pr tty big money.
This guy - I know of this second hand - was in real estate in some way and found out this tiny plot of land was also for sale. He bought it and as the two land buyers started plans to build they realized that all the utilities (there's no sewer there) had to go through this spot. He made a nice chunk of change of it. The two land owners if I remember correctly got in a bidding war over it.