The picture above is another million dollar example of foreclosure slop. The home, located at 101 21st Avenue North in St. Petersburg Florida was once a proud and beautiful example of residential beauty. It sits on three large lots in one of the nicest areas of town. Just a few short years ago, it’s lush tropical landscape and interesting gardens made it the jewel of the street. Today it’s a vacant and crumbling eyesore, a blight on the neighborhood. The foreclosure mills have made such a mess out of the foreclosure, that the home will have to be re-foreclosed before it can ever be sold. But it’s such a mess that I predict it will just fall into continued disrepair and be liquidated for next to nothing. Here’s the anatomy of this foreclosure mess:
Have a look at the property appraiser card for this property, gorrellpropertyappraiser
12/26/2007, David Stern Enterprises, (DJSP) on behalf of Citimortgage, filed a foreclosure. gorrellcitilis
1/18/2008, Shapiro and Fishman, on behalf of HSBC file a second foreclosure on the same property. gorrellhsbclis
2/01/2008, HSBC files affidavit swearing they cannot get personal service on the defendants.
3/13/2008, Scott Anderson/MERS executes assignment of mortgage from Delta to HSBC. gorrellassign
9/11/2008, Court enters Order of Dismissal, dismissing the HSBC foreclosure. gorrellmasterdismissal
9/11/2008, Court enters Order of Dismissal, dismissing the Citi foreclosure. gorrellmasterdismissalciti
4/16/2010, Court enters Final Judgment of Foreclosure to HSBC for $1 million. gorrelljudgment
4/24/2009, Citi files a Voluntary Dismissal. gorrelldocket
6/24/2010, Court issues Certificate of Title to HSBC Bank. gorrellCT
To the untrained eye, all those documents and the chain of slop and mistakes may not mean much, but the title work on this property will give any experienced title attorney nightmares. It’s just a mess on top of a mess, topped off with an unresolvable mess. It’s hard to tell what’s the worst thing about all this. Is it the fact that the judgment is void or voidable as to the Defendants Gorrell due to the improper service? The post-filing assignment of mortgage? The questionable veracity of the HSBC Assignment? HSBC ignoring the Citi Lis Pendens? The code enforcement liens?
I’m going to keep watching this property to see what becomes of it. HSBC claims they’ve paid $35,000 in property taxes on the home and $19,000 in homeowner’s insurance. The taxes work out to $11,000 per year, so HSBC will keep eating those taxes for years to come.
The irony of the whole thing is I alerted the foreclosure mill attorney to the problems with this file more than a year ago….it would have been easy enough to resolve some of the problems if anyone cared enough to put the time into the file, but you know….in this rush to push these cases through….who has the time to do things correctly…..there’s another even more messed up foreclosure that I’ll share with everyone later….
Hmmm…Scott Anderson…interesting. Click the link below for some fun reading on the life and times of Mr. Anderson.
https://www.foreclosurehamlet.org/profiles/blogs/introducing-ocwen-and-mr-scott?xg_source=activity
In a recent hearing, I was warned by one of the waiting attorny’s that plaintiff’s lawyer was “very good.” I had twenty cases ready to cite, a tabbed chambers copy and he had … Nothing! His only argument against a facial standing issue was “but we own the note.”
These guys are disgraceful, they are destroying neighborhoods and the value of all of our homes. It makes me feel great every day I go to work!