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HomehousingThis lady sucks

This lady sucks

If you read Yahoo finance on a semi frequent basis, you may have noticed yesterday’s article “The 25 year old foreclosure from hell.” You should read this article because it’s A) worth your time and B) really really REALLY frustrating. Here’s a blurb from it…

The 71-year-old retired insurance saleswoman has been living in her house, a two-story on a half acre in a tidy middle-class neighborhood here in central Florida, since 1978. The last time she made a mortgage payment was October 1985.

[…] Ms. Campbell, who is handling her case these days without a lawyer, has learned how to work the ropes of the legal system so well that she has met every attempt by a lender to repossess her home with multiple appeals and counteractions, burying the plaintiffs facing her under piles of paperwork.

That’s right. This lady sucks. The article explains that she stopped paying on her mortgage in 1985 after an illness forced her to lose income. Not paying your bills because you lack the financial means (or health) to do so is a legitimate reason to default in my opinion. After all, there are no laws that says you have to pay your bills.

I’m not pissed at Ms. Campbell for going in to foreclosure, but because she is gaming the system. Here’s how…

The briefs presented dozens of reasons why Ms. Campbell thought the bank didn’t have the right to her house: Paul Campbell’s signature was forged on the original mortgage, she said, and the original sellers never received money from the bank. At other times, she said the mortgage was never properly conveyed between banks and federal agencies, and she demanded paperwork that they were unable to immediately produce.

Attorneys’ fees and court costs from previous cases hadn’t been paid, or the amounts were wrong, she argued. One brief said that “Defendant Campbell specifically denies the existence of any ‘debt.'”

So it’s official. The lady is a liar and she sucks bad. She refuses to make payments towards her mortgage and she refuses to turn the house over to the bank. I don’t care where you stand on the ethical/moral obligation of forecelosures, whichever way you slice it, this lady is a leech.

It’s times like this, I wish our judicial system wasn’t so darn judicious. It shouldn’t take 25+ years to foreclose on a house. If the hag didn’t pay, take her house away (hey, that rhymed). Do you know anyone that has abused the system? Filed bankruptcy on debt they intentionally racked up? Gone in to foreclosure when they could easily afford their mortgage payments? How do you keep a system that’s designed to help those in need from being abused by jerk-faces like this?

p.s. on a semi-related note. I had another rant about something that pisses me off over at the Lending Tree blog. Check out my thoughts on the rise and fall of the Kardashian MasterCard. Final verdict: The thing sucked from the very beginning.

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27 COMMENTS

  1. Corruption is everywhere. From low-life scum to the so-called elite, there will always be those who game the system for their own gain. There cannot be justice when those dispensing it can also be guilty. Sorry for being such a pessimist, but I call it like I see it. Trust me, I try to be ignorant as much as possible because I want to live in bliss… Maybe I should just have blind faith…

  2. Wow. I’d hate to live like this. I mean how much could her mortgage possibly be if she bought her house in 1978. My mom’s house was $10K back then. If she just did what was right, she would have had a paid for home by now.

    It’s not the bank’s responsibility to fund her housing. When my mom had rentals and people just stopped paying it would break my heart that they assumed it was okay to assume my 75 year old mom on a fixed incomee was going to fund their lifestyle. Stealing is bad, no matter how old you are or who you are stealing from.

  3. Yeah, these are the types of people that I can’t stand. They definitely can borrow money, but then for some reason they feel like they don’t need to pay it back….. Makes no sense to me, and I’m sure I’m indirectly paying for them somehow….

    Oh well, I have no control over this, so I’m choosing not to let it bother me. All I can worry about is my own finances and my own debts. And, I’m planning to clear my name from all debts by April 2011! If you want to read my story, just click on my name above.

  4. Where’s karma when you need it?? I can’t believe she’s gotten away with it for so long… 25 years?? That…is…crazy!! Only person I know who was able to “buck the system” was an ex-beau of my sister’s… claimed Workman’s Comp for a supposed back injury at work… didn’t stop him from keeping up his partying lifestyle… and he was eventually caught, and lost his job.

  5. Is she wrong? Most likely, but I still like this story. Why? Because in the past year I have seen way too many stories of banks doing exactly what she is doing (lying, taking property that does not belong to them, etc…). Banks use perverse laws and rocket dockets to take homes without regard to the true merits of the case. Remember, the mortgage is an agreement governed by the certain laws (just like any other contract). BOTH the banks and the borrowers agreed to abide by these laws (whether good or bad) by entering into a contract. Here’s the way I see it:

    If the banks as an industry see no moral problems in using the laws on the books (even when they are wrong), then the banking industry should have no moral problem when a borrower uses every law he or she can.

    “Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.” Matthew 7:1-2

    The “measure” that the banks have choosen is the law, so I say, let that “measure” be measured back to them.

    • I agree as well.. and on a side note, I am disappointed that in one post, you are talking about a Bible study, and two posts later, you are resorting to name calling (slander) and phrases such as “If the hag didn’t pay, take her house away”. I might not agree with what she did (and I don’t).. but I also think that we’ve all gotten things we didn’t deserve, including grace.

  6. Wow.

    Though I think illegal lying (assuming that is what is going on) is certainly in a different category than legal “strategic defaults” by people who can pay the bills.

    I know one person who went into debt to pay off student loans, then ultimately filed for bankruptcy on the debt. Because you can’t bankrupt student loans, but you can bankrupt CC debt.

  7. I was born in 1985! I think it’s crazy that someone is able to get out of paying a loan for as long as I’ve been alive. The problem is, there are many people who have legitimate problems making mortgage payments who don’t know how to protect themselves this way. It’s hard to combat this because you will make the innocent suffer along with the just.

    I’ve known people who had good jobs and great skills who, when they got laid off, decided not to work for as long as possible and simply collect unemployment. I know people who have filed for bankruptcy when it seemed to me they could have paid if they altered their spending heavy lifestyle. While some people abuse it, some people genuinely need the help. I think credit card debt should be like student loan debt–unable to be gotten rid of, and you have to be able to prove you need to defer paying it. They can offer income sensitive payments and graduated payments and a timetable just the same. Maybe if people didn’t have any get out of jail free cards, they’d think twice about spending money they don’t have.

  8. I’ve seen abuse of the system. When I was 18, I worked in a lawyer’s real estate conveyancing office and there was a lot of shady business being conducted there! The “small” stuff was lying to banks, lying to other lawyers, forging signatures, not owning up to mistakes and blaming everyone else, etc. Eventually, this office I worked for began to turn a blind eye when their clients started to flip houses illegally. They didn’t care. They were being paid about 6 times as much for processing these flips and if the bank approved a mortgage based on false information provided by the buyer/realtor it wasn’t their problem. As far as they were concerned they did their “due diligence”. It was pretty sick, too, when these hotshot realtors lavished gifts on everyone in the office and their family and kids with the exorbitant amount of money they profited from the sales. There’s corruption and abuse everywhere whether it’s the homeowner, the bank, the lawyer, the realtor, or the mortgage broker. Everyone is trying to screw everyone else before they get screwed. And, sometimes, they all work together to screw the system.

    • I work for lawyers currently, and one of the most frustrating things for me is how little actual law is practiced. It isn’t quite as bad as your office was, but there’s certainly plenty of strategizing and trickery: We’re going to wait to see how much the other side produces first, so we see all their information–then we’re going to produce the bare minimum for our side. We’re going to file our pleadings at 4:55 the day they’re due so the other side doesn’t have any time to review them. We’re going to initiate a new motion based on one typo in their motion, just to keep them so busy they can’t deal with the real questions at hand.

      It would make me sick to my stomach if I went to law school thinking I was going to get into law to help people. I’d say we do about %5 helping people, 95% helping ourselves.

      But I will end my rant here. Can you tell I’m a little biased? 😛

  9. I know someone who took 2 separate false disability claims, all because his work upped the quotas for everyone’s jobs (he was in sales) and was being quicker to fire people (basically the company needed to let people go and was trying to do it by raising the standard & cutting people who didn’t meet it). He took a total of 4-5 months off of work, fully paid, claiming some sort of illness. I once said he was lazy, and he took real offense to it! lol. He did eventually get fired from the job, for whatever reason. People do sick, ridiculous stuff like this allllllll the time, unfortunately. Think about all those people who got those FEMA payments after Katrina, under false pretenses. People seem to think the money doesn’t come from somewhere.

  10. Let me preface this by saying I started working at 13 so I guess I milked the system out of 1 year of PT labor for which I did not pay taxes. Okay had to get that off my chest.

    But on a more serious note…this really gets me. Probably because I have a strong work ethic and a conscience that won’t quit. How peaceful can your life be when you are always looking for a way to scam people. Real hardworking people are loosing their homes, not because they are lazy or don’t want to pay, but because of unfortunate situations. And to top it off, this is the type of article that is posted during this day and age. I’m made at the people who ran the article just as much as her for being so down right shady.

    I see it all the time…worker’s comp for people who aren’t hurt but can slide a few bills to a Dr. under the table. Also, the woman who keeps having kids so that she doesn’t have to work and gets to live free on the system. That really bugs me. Fraud is a really awful thing any way you slice it and I am tried of seeing people get over.

  11. Also…the Kim card…really, does anyone really want to own the card of a person with financial troubles. Just like if my bank was going under I wouldn’t sign up for some type of savings plan…the same holds true for the other financial products I have. She and her family are the worst when it comes to being fiscally responsible, why would I want to support her financial efforts???

  12. I saw this yesterday. Things like this makes me pissed off. Kind of like my tenant that is always fricken late with her rent. What is with people these days thinking that they have no responsibility to pay the rent/lease/mortgage? Some days I feel like setting fire to the place just to get rid of her, but alas, that’s illegal so I won’t. This woman is beyond the pale and should be in jail for fraud. Any other country and she would not have survived with this BS for this long. It’s the same thing with people sitting on welfare of whatever for years when they could find something. Makes me want to spit.

    • Tell us how you really feel Sandy 🙂 I agree with you – the sense of entitlement is unbelievable!

  13. The story is definitely frustrating (AND ANNOYING).

    But I must say, it sounds like some disorganization on the bank’s end too. They didn’t foreclose on the house and take action in time, so they were dismissed? TWICE?

    Talk about a lack of organization costing you money.

  14. A good reason for foreclosure, unfortunately people like this person will continue to game the system. I think the part of it is the banks fault too.

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  16. Sure, I know a system that can get rid of this lady. Look at China, send in the goon squad to crack some heads and she’ll be gone in a flash. 🙂

  17. I read the article on my own, before seeing your reference to it, and my reaction was exactly the opposite: at least there is one person out there making the banks jump through the same hoops the banks have stubbornly insisted on making countless lenders jump through.

    You seem to assume that the banks are in the right and Ms. Campbell is in the wrong. But what if she is right? What if the loan had been fraudulently transferred, or if one or more of the banks had failed to provide some necessary disclosures before beginning foreclosure? The article offers as fact a statement that “Two foreclosure actions against her…were thrown out because her lender sat on its hands too long after filing a case and lost its window to foreclose.” It is telling that this case is 25 years in the making and yet there has never been a judgment against her. Perhaps her case (*gasp*) actually has some merit?

    Legal standings, statutes of limitations, disclosure requirements, and the like are in place to ensure that all parties are protected by our legal system. Rather than passing judgment on Ms. Campbell before the court has made its decision, perhaps we should assume her innocent until proven otherwise, and allow the appropriate authorities to make a determination after carefully weighing all arguments. The courts exist to protect all parties, not to adopt policies of prejudice so as to minimize inconvenience to the plaintiffs.

    Personally, if a creditor was to attempt to make a similar case against me, I’d feel much better knowing they would be held to the highest standard — submitting all evidence completely, accurately, and in a reasonable amount of time. And if I felt strongly that my creditor’s claim was baseless, I’d feel secure in the knowledge that I had as many avenues of recourse available for my defense as Ms. Campbell has apparently been able to utilize over the past 25 years.

  18. You are right – that lady sucks! I am so thankful I don’t know anyone like that. How many of us skim and save so we can pay out debts? People like the lady you highlighted in your article mock us all.

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