Blech! The other side of eviction...(kinda long)

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

Well. I have seen hell, and it is the house my best friend bought.

This particular house was repossesed by the bank. The former owners had taken out a second mortgage and not botherd to make a single payment on it. (Instead, they spent the money on a BMW. Remember this. Keep reading, it gets better!)
I was warned by my roommate before I went over there. “It’s bad,” he said. “Really bad.”
So, cleaning products and shovel in hand, I make my way over to the house.
It is clearly worse than I thought.
First of all, all the stuff that my roomie and friends had cleared out already was on the front lawn, in garbage bags. Approximately 40 of them. Random furniture, boxes of clothes, garbage. You name it, it was out there. There was still plenty more to go.

I walk in the front door. Cobwebs on the entire door frame led to cobwebs all over the ceiling. A bee flew in the door when I came in. I went to swat it back outside with a newspaper, but a spider crawled out of the corner of the doorframe and SNATCHED it back into its lair.

There was a pile of garbage and clothing in the living room that was 4 feet high. This is what they got out of one bedroom, once they got the door open and were able to shovel it out. All of the bedrooms were like this. Mattresses strewn about, dressers full of 25 years worth of crap. Water damage that was never repaired.

I turned to my friend and said, “Best Friend, what the hell have you gotten yourself into?”

We spent all day from 3 p.m. until 11 p.m. last night cleaning it out. The master bedroom closet took 18 heavy duty garbage bags by itself. We still have not tackled the garage due to fear of snakes.
Oh, and let’s not mention the back yard, with its bags upon bags of aluminum cans. The deepest part of the jungle looks like the golf course at Kiahwah compared to this.

Oh, and these people had two of everything. Two stoves, two refrigerators, two hot water heaters, two washers, two dryers. And none of them work. And they are all spread about, throughout the garage and the backyard.

Did I also mention that this house is in a nice, up and coming neighborhood? And that my friend got it for a steal at the auction? And that all of the neighbors have volunteered to help her and her husband out? (Especially the landscaping guy down the street. Boy was he a hottie!)
So yes, the outlook is bleak right now… But in 6 months, we will have transformed this place from crack-house to cozy, comfortable first home. I can’t wait.

We took some pictures this morning. One day, I’m going to post them as a warning for other people who buy houses at auction… Know what you’re getting into!!! She sure didn’t, but we’re working on it!

Skerri

2

I am most impressed by this line. Evidently she got a bargain house AND some decent neighbors, to boot. Tells you something about what these people thought of the previous owners, or maybe they’re just nosy and want to see how they lived in there. Sounds like they’ll have some interesting stories for your friend.

Post the pictures (with your friend’s permission). Maybe I’ll feel better about my place.

3

ear perk

Furniture? Where?

Sorry, college student reflex…

As for cleaning out a totally trashed house… Good Luck! Its good to know the neighbours are being nice about it and that everybody is making it better. Spreading beauty is a very good thing.

4

Suggest that your friends rent a dumpster. Easier on them; easier on the neighbors.

5

good grief, i would have called crime scene clean up. you never know what could be under all that. they may have misplaced a person or two.

may a comfy, safe, home be created out of this chaos. y’all are fantastic to help out like this.

6

Ditto on the dumpster idea. They’re not cheap, but when you have a lot to move, it’s really the way to go. Plus your friend won’t have to have all that garbage on his/her lawn until trash day, or haul it in their car/truck/van when they have a load.

I’ll bet if your friend hosts a backyard picnic for the neighbors after everything is cleaned up, the neighbors will love them forever.

7

Don’t forget to get the landscaper’s number, while your at it! A good landscaper is prize. One that fires your engines while whacking your weeds is priceless. :wink:

8

For a few miserable months I worked in leasing at an apartment community here in town. Luckily it was one of the decent ones. Even so, occasionally people would get evicted (or skip town) and leave QUITE a mess. I never saw anything too awful, but they always took pictures (for future legal use) and my boss showed me several from the files. Staggering. And yet I know none of them could be anything like what you’re describing.

Still, as gross and discouraging as the house sounds, I’m all tingly thinking about its potential and how it’s going to be a HOME again someday. Maybe I’m just hormonal, but I like that.

9

Boy, you could have been describing a house I helped clean out in college! It was a rental, and the contracter wouldn’t touch it until the worst of the crap was out. So one of the members of my business fraternity had a brother who worked with the contractor and they payed us to tote out trash and do what we could. The saddest part was finding pictures of a little kid in the mess and realizing he was being raised like that.

You friend is lucky to have good neighbors like that. The only person that came around while we were cleaning was the sheriff, looking for the former residents.

10

Well, we had to nix the idea of a dumpster, because financially my friend can’t hack it. (They still haven’t had the loan signed over to them because the termite man had to inspect the place. Which he wouldn’t do until we got it cleared out.)
But, the good news is that the garbage man came yesterday and hauled it all away… .well, what the scavengers didn’t take.
I told my friend that she should put a sign up saying “Take it if you want, but mind the body lice!” Ya know, the entire time we were cleaning, I kept thinking of that scene in “Four Rooms” where the kids find the dead hooker under the mattress… I was waiting on it to happen.
A group of people stopped by yesterday and started tearing open the bags. My friend’s mother in law went out there and told them they had better bag that stuff right back up, or she was going inside to get her shotgun. By the time she got out there, they had torn open 4 bags of nasty clothes and basically spread them all out on the lawn. (I wish she had a shotgun at that point.)
The termite man returned yesterday also, and pointed out what she needed to do do get some form signed off on. Not too much work, but nothing any of us can do, so it will cost a little bit.
The neighbors are just awesome. The one guy next door said that he was pissed that she was moving in. When she asked him why, he said that now he would actually have to mow his lawn since he didn’t have the crack neighbors to make his look good.
There will be quite the backyard bash once we get everything straight. I have already told Best Friend to make sure she gets someone to watch the baby, because we are just going to let it rip once that place is done.
I have been given permission by Best Friend to post pics of the house as soon as they are developed. So, if you would like to see exactly how much crap we moved out of a 3 bedroom house, check back here and I’ll post the link.

Skerri

11

Then be sure to slip a big batch of cookies or brownies to the trash haulers!

Supposedly you can prevent animals (and maybe trash pickers) from tearing open trash bags by adding a tablespoon of ammonia to each bag.

And best friend now has a neighbor who helps out AND has a sense of humor. What a deal!

12

Interesting update…
Found out today that the people that used to own the house were arrested SEVERAL times for posession of crack, crank, and marijuana. Hmm… Guess it really WAS a crackhouse!

Anyways. The neighbors have all been by to tell us horror stories about the previous owners getting arrested and there being crime scene tape everywhere.

When we were cleaning out the garage (which had just as much stuff as the rest of the house, but it was all wet) we happened upon a mummified rat. It apparently got in the attic above the garage, and keeled over. It was really gross.

On the other hand, we found an entire silver tea service set. Best Friend and I have consorted with Brother, and we are going to polish them up and sell them. We are giving the money to a friend who has a baby due in December, who will probably be hitting some rough financial times.

Well, everything is FINALLY cleaned out of the house and the exterminators come tomorrow. (They refused to come until we got it emptied out.) It only took 4 days and about 90 trash bags.
Pictures coming soon!

Skerri, who will never volunteer her services again, sight unseen, at least…

13

You have just made it into my book as 'damn good friend to have around". After what you’ve seen, it makes you appreciate what you have, right?

One other thought: your friend may want to have the police come by with a drug-sniffing dog to make sure the place is ‘clean’. Nothing like having a dinner party ruined when a guest discovers an overlooked secret stash from the previous tenant, or worse, police get called to your house for some reason, no matter how innocent, and you get blamed for something they left behind and the police may have overlooked or plain just could not get to (from the sounds of the house). Now that the house is cleaned, it would be much easier for the dog to find anything.

And take put up a picture of the tea set: I may be interested…