Rich SF residents get a shock: Someone bought their street

http://www.sfchronicle.com ^ | 7 August 2017 | Ross & Matier

[BackRoads775]

Thanks to a little-noticed auction sale, a South Bay couple are the proud owners of one of the most exclusive streets in San Francisco — and they’re looking for ways to make their purchase pay.

Tina Lam and Michael Cheng snatched up Presidio Terrace — the block-long, private oval street lined by 35 megamillion-dollar mansions — for $90,000 and change in a city-run auction stemming from an unpaid tax bill. They outlasted several other bidders.

[Lockbox]

This is too Rich!

Tollway?

Sell back to the homeowners at three times his cost?

I like the selling of parking spots to others.

This is great!

[Liz]

The really funny part is the new owners are considering..... not the residents .....but renting parking spaces to outsiders.

Parking in and around that area is scarce.

LOL.

[faithhopecharity]

Ibvestors should erect a 700 unit public housing section 8 project there. Guaranteed income and it could fit right onto that space if built tall enough.

[Political Junkie Too]

The property is too valuable for people like the Chengs to own it.

Just as with the elderly homeowners along South Florida's intracoastal were told after Kelo, their property they owned since the 1970s was now too good for them, and eminent domain blight proceedings commenced.

Watch for the gated road in front of multi-million dollar mansions to suddenly become condemned by the city and seized under the Kelo ruling.

-PJ

p.s. The Florida homeowners won their legal battle.

[catnipman]

i love the fact that the purchasers quietly sat on their newly purchased property for two years before starting to do anything with it, making it nearly impossible for the homeowners to make a timely claim.

[LibertyOh]

The $14 per year tax for a “block-long, private oval street lined by 35 megamillion-dollar mansions” itself shows something totally out of whack with the state’s property tax system. San Francisco appears to have an average property tax rate of about 1.2%, indicating a value of about $1,170. With the 90k present sale valuation, the tax should go to about $1,080 per year. But the reality it is clearly worth far more, as the 35 owners are figuring out. It’s only fair to see them buy the land back for the HOA with the tax appropriately increased at least 1000 times. Would be a minor payment for those on this street.

As a former HOA president in Ohio, property taxes were a very clear obligation and line item on our budget. While I was involved, we changed from a self managed HOA to hiring a professional management company. One of the issues I saw going in was a similar failure of prior management (trustees and a part time administrator) to meet legal obligations because mail was sent to a former agent/attorney that retired without redirecting his business.

Likely there was a company managing this HOA and it will be interesting as the finger pointing begins for who dropped the ball decades ago, and who failed to follow up and correct an issue so basic to managing the assets of an HOA.

[Milton Miteybad]

A quick online check of tax sale procedures in CA indicates that the redemption period (the period during which you can pay back taxes, penalties and interest, thereby eliminating the tax lien against the property) expires at the close of the last business day prior to the day of the tax sale. In other words...in California, once the tax sale has been conducted, there is no further right of redemption as there is in other states. In CA, unless the tax sale is set aside for some irregularity, said sale is apparently final once the gavel has come down.

I also find it very odd that a homeowners' association, which itself may use the power of foreclosure and sale as a means to collect delinquent homeowners' assessments, would fall 30 years delinquent in their own property tax obligations to the county. Their excuse, according to the article, is that the tax invoices were sent to the office of an attorney which the HOA had not used in decades, but still, you'd think that at some point, somebody at the HOA would have noticed that they hadn't gotten a tax bill from the county in years, and would have sought to make further inquiry.

BTW...in CA, a property cannot be sold at a tax sale until at least five years after the taxpayer falls behind in payment. A property owner could bring his obligations current at any time during that five years and prevent the property from being sold for back taxes.

However, once the tax sale is conducted in CA, you have to seek a rescission of the sale, something which is rarely granted.

Frankly, it sounds like the people serving on the HOA board are clueless boobs who aren't paying attention to matters that should be automatically and effortlessly addressed in the normal course of business.

[tumblindice]

They may have bought the right to maintain it.
As an example, in my state (yeah IN/CA: apples & oranges) it is impossible to `vacate’ (that is, the state doesn’t want it anymore and would like the taxes, so adjacent owners take to the middle, like an abandoned RR track) a public way if it will deprive adjacent homeowners of access to their homes.

But I would like to think that these two buyers are going to put the blocks to these homeowners.

[Kartographer]

Install lots of park benches for the homeless to sleep on!

[Bigg Red]

This has got to be a joke of some sort. How could a private citizen own a road? (Not that I have any knowledge of the law.)

[Smellin Salt]

Make it the new homeless area. And/or a “sanctuary street”.

[Bigg Red]

I would love to see that one!

[Keyhopper]

I would have installed parking meters last night and booted every car on the block this morning.

[faithhopecharity]

Yes! And the commie style political hack commissars living on that street couldn't object to housing 700 homeless people, could they? 🤡🤡😇

[Bigg Red]

Okay, I can see by the comments of others here that I don’t know anything about property laws.

[alternatives?]

They should line the sidewalk with park bench beds and love booths and sell passes to the homeless and homosexual communities. The passes would allow them to enter the street.

[easternsky]

Best idea yet defiantly best idea yet.

[editor-surveyor]

.
>> “Surely the current residents wouldn’t mind paying for access past the gate? LOL!” <<

You can stop laughing!

Under California law, the residents have “Prescriptive” rights to use of the road.

The bidders shot themselves in the foot on this by not consulting a good land rights lawyer before bidding.
.

[Moltke]

Some funny comments so far. Now just wait for these two to get squashed by the home owners, aided and abetted by their crooked SF judiciary pals. They’ll end up bankrupt and homeless before you can say “corruption.” OK, that’s my call. Anyone up for a $0.05 bet?

[Tea Party Terrorist]

The homeowners are the stupid ones. This is 100% their own fault