“An attorney for PJ’s Construction said the developers didn’t want to hire surveyors.”
Well there’s your problem.
The answer here should be simple… the developers pay for demolition, removal of the house, and restore the property back to the condition where they found it.
They’ve sued everyone instead…
The lady that owns the property, the people who used to own it, a bank, an insurance company, I think a person that lives on another lot, the person who sold them the other lots.
In all likelihood the lawsuits are a stall until they can declare bankruptcy and start a new company.
But they can’t just “restore” the property, it was full of mature native trees/plants and for bulldozed.
Also the reason they didn’t “need” surveyors, was lots are clearly marked via numbers on telephone poles. They just read the numbers wrong. Which is even worse.
But they can’t just “restore” the property, it was full of mature native trees/plants and for bulldozed.
Oh God…tree law…I never realized how much I missed this.
Psh, the trees are the easy part, trees (for the most part) stay where you plant them.
Good luck reintroducing the pocono swallow, or even being able to afford to fly a Bird Law specialist out from Philly to determine damages.
Seriously tho, this lady just got a $500k house and probably a 1/10th of that in damages for a lot she paid 22k for.
Just have the Lorax settle this
Biggest thing I miss from old reddit. Oh well.
The restoration part is where everyone involved is totally screwed.
Dear dumbass,
Please remove your abandoned property.
Love,
Attorney with the easiest job ever
Or just give the property the owner the house for free in exchange for not suing and cut their losses. Would probably be cheaper in the long run, especially counting legal fees.
She doesn’t want the house because it balloons the taxes on the property from a few hundred to thousands per year
Wouldn’t the property owner already own the house?
First: she has a right to be made whole and it’s not her concern what the people who wronged her have to go through to do that.
Second: she never wanted a house. She had a special vision for the space, a space that has now been damaged.
Third: squatters have rights and she may not be able to evict them. Their rights may take precedence over hers here.
Not disagreeing with any of this but it should be clear to this lady her vision was screwed the moment a developer built a bunch of cookie cutter houses all over that area. A meditation center doesn’t really work in that area any longer.
The issue with the taxes, the lawsuit, and the squatters is exactly why I would have just taken the offer to trade properties, she has an enormous headache on her hands and bailed on the easy way out of it.
Why don’t they just pick up the house, and put it over there?
Seriously, I’ve seen houses being moved on trucks before, would it be faster and cheaper to do that?
It looks like slab on grade construction, there’s no moving those. The houses that can be moved are up on posts or over a basement.
The land has permanent damage and no trees genius.
Which is why she was offered the identical lot next door that still has all of that?
So, protip for future developers: is there a nicer lot next to yours that you want? Build a house on it and go “whoopsie” and offer tradesies
The still vacant three-bedroom, two-bath house on a 1-acre lot in Puna’s Hawaiian Paradise Park is worth about $500,000. But it could cost a lot of people more than that as they head to court to sort it out.
Wow. A house is cheaper in Hawaii than it is in SoCal?
The housemate of my mother just sold her mother’s house in Orange County. 2 bedroom and 1 bath, so smaller, for over $1 million.
Well, sure, if you don’t own the land it’s built on. :)
Did you look up paradise park on maps? It’s not close to any big city. Look further out from cities in California and you’ll see similar prices, but of course you won’t be as close to the ocean, but I guess in Hawaii you’re always close to the ocean.
It’s in one of the most gorgeous and desirable parts of the nation, a straight shot to the ocean (not all of Big Island is coastal!), and a short drive from beautiful Pāhoa.
it is extremely beautiful! but realistically, most people want to live near amenities.
Yes, but it also isn’t near any high paying jobs.
If only there were some way to work remotely.
Unless you are a native Hawaiian, you can only lease the land for 100 years. Further, the cost of living in HI is way way higher than SoCal because everything has to be imported.
Source: ex-Navy who lived there and used to crash open houses in diamond head for snacks when he was poor.
Unless you are a native Hawaiian, you can only lease the land for 100 years.
That doesn’t sound right. IIRC, one of the biggest reasons why Guam and the Marianas don’t want to become states is that “land ownership only for natives” rules aren’t allowed under statehood (for the same reason segregating against black people isn’t allowed anymore, even though the circumstances aren’t the same), but that ship has long since sailed for Hawaii.
Had to go back and look it up. The answer is it just depends. Some land is owned by the State of HI, in which non natives can own it where other land is owned by the Natives through the Monarchy of HI and can only be leased:
https://www.hawaiistar.com/can-non-hawaiians-own-land-in-hawaii/
Puna is a rural area, not comparable to Orange County.
There are very few high paying jobs in Hawaii, and everything else costs twice as much. Even $500,000 is more than most locals can afford. Also, this isn’t beach property.
$500k? Where I live that would be a cardboard box
That’s just the house, not the land. That’s also a very rural area of a rural island. There are very few high paying jobs on that island, and even fewer in that area. Everything else on the islands costs twice as much as you pay.
