Be Careful what you buy

[Dave2]

interesting story out of the US

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

[Jack]

Interesting Dave, but in Ontario it is even worse than in that article. Here a tax deed only conveys what is set out in the tax deed less anything that can be claimed by adverse possession by those two adjoining landowners. That is, he would not get title to the land on which the buildings sit. As to the mail box, he is probably out of luck there as well. Mailboxes of that type are normally constructed on the municipally owned road allowance. I have made mistakes like this myself and walked away with just a loss of my deposit. This is where Dave and my grandad disagree. Dave correctly says you should get your money in as soon as possible, whereas taking your time after the sale to do a very thorough investigation, and using a lawyer to close it with title insurance where applicable, is a contrarian strategy which also has merit. Either way, I agree, after you win the property is not a time to relax. Good post Dave.

[Frank]

More horror stories

I'm sure that in this case it is the Counties fault as they likely originally required the one reserve foot parcel as a holding zone to limit the development until certain things happened....but failed to have it removed before the development proceeded.   I would put nasty letters in their mailboxes every day, and perhaps paint a one foot wide purple stripe on the wall of their villas, and place a row of ugly garden gnomes on the one foot between the two properties....just keep doing crazy things until they decide to pay up.

[Dave2]

Interesting Dave, but in Ontario it is even worse than in that article. Here a tax deed only conveys what is set out in the tax deed less anything that can be claimed by adverse possession by those two adjoining landowners.

Jack:  

Adverse possession, or dealing with neighbors who put a gate across a public roadway to cut off your property access, are always risks.  That is why I think people are crazy to bid full market price.  Of course there is the every day problem of competing against people who know what they are doing like Frank and PFM.    The one problem I really hate though is where the property zoning and the conservation authority are not in sync or even worse where different planners in the same municipality disagree. When you have a zoning of rural residential you expect you can build.    Kawartha Lakes comes to mind as a spot to bid carefully.  Still trying to sort out some of those mistakes I made.

The real horror story comes when you have to justify your actions to your significant other who keeps the books.    That is a tremendous incentive to minimize these types of problems.

Of course if you do your homework sometimes you get surprises of the other type. Like finding out the island property you got was formerly owned by the most exotic island seller in the world out of Germany, as you can see from his website.      https://www.vladi-private-islands.de/

He doesn't touch anything unless it is first class.  

Even more interesting is when you find an even earlier owner's.  ship which is wrecked on the island was burned by members of this infamous family  http://www.black-donnellys.com/the-story/ in rum running days.  At that time my former owner  a (in)famous bootleger apparently knew this person;  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al_Capone, personally.  
 

[Frank]

Dam....I wanted that island so badly, but just wasn't a good time for me to be making a bid on anything....pretty sure I would have outbid skin-flint Dave.