Pardon my limited posts but I’ve been a bit preoccupied.
After two years on the market our modest house in St. Paul’s Frogtown neighborhood has an offer. We cosigned the mortgage for family members who weren’t able to stay. It lies in the shadow of the State Capitol. Two years of mortgage payments, property taxes and worry about having it stripped of its copper pipe by looters while it stands empty – knock on wood – will soon be over.
We had knocked the price down a couple of times in reaction to the slow real estate market to about twenty-five percent of our purchase price. The most recent price slash did the trick but a day before we heard about the offer we learned that a realtor showing the home had surprised a squatter. She was surprised to find a bedroom door locked and music playing from behind the door. A voice behind the door told her to get out.
Our realtor called us that night. She had her husband with her and three police cruisers out front. The squatter/squatters weren’t there but they’d left behind a blow up mattress and a couple pets locked in a side bedroom. Doors inside had been broken and a couple initials had been scribbled on the kitchen wall. K loves D. (Actually it was a slash not “loves” that connected the letters.)
With an offer hanging in the balance I scurried down the following day, last Saturday, and spent six hours cleaning up. I found a pile of refuse at the bottom of the basement stairs and the front door dismantled. No pets though. Apparently after my Realtor left having locked the door the squatter had returned to retrieve personal items the mattress and pets.
I found the kitchen and back bedroom floor littered with gospel music CDs. Nice to know my guests weren’t satanists. At first I planned to toss them in the box of trash that I found in the kitchen. After tossing a couple in I espied two cameras in the trash and litter. I pulled them out thinking I might find some pictures in them and then retrieved the gospel CDs. I piled trash out against the back fence by the alley for later disposal. On the way home I listened to the music. I only had time to sample about 15 of the CD’s. Good music. I found memory chips in the cameras and downloaded them to my computer. There were lots of pictures of kittens and puppies. Animal lover obviously. There was also a series of pictures of a young woman wearing a Wahapten, ND Hockey team sweatshirt in various stages of a jump. The final one showed her full face. A call to the high schools counseling staff seemed imminent.There wasn’t much I could accomplish by identifying her. I learned that the next morning when I got a call from a Frogtown neighbor at 4AM.
The police were back. As he was leaving for work he had noticed that the kitchen light I had left on had been turned off. The squatters had broken or stolen the floor lamp I had left on a timer to keep the illusion of someone residing in the house so I had left the kitchen light on as a substitute. As he looked in the window blinds he saw a dim light coming from the bedroom. He put me on the phone with one of the cops and the officer apologized for breaking the back door to get in. The intruders were still there including a young lady. Before he let me talk with her he explained that while trespass was a given I’d be out of luck in the court because I couldn’t prove they they had done any of the damage. The kids were the other next door neighbors.
I don’t know what the young woman thought when I asked her if she was from Wahpeton. She was. I told her I liked her CD’s and asked her if she wanted them back. She seemed not to know what I was talking about but offered to let me keep them. I’m not sure she liked the music. I had found the little CD player smashed to smithereens when I picked up on Saturday. Maybe there were other midnight visitors before her.
I’ve been on the phone with contractors and building inspectors for the past week. Yesterday I replaced three doors destroyed by the neighbors (or someone). Tuesday an electrical contractor will make good the demands of St. Paul’s electrical inspector. I’ve got two weeks to get everything squared away. If only I had a school district willing to pay me anything I wanted for this little headache. I wouldn’t even mind their threatening me with of eminent domain.
