[MediocreButArrogant]

I-Team: Squatters' twisted tale angers homeowner - 8 News NOW

[tiger08]

Thank God the squatter mess on our street is long over! The bank has since remodeled the house, AGAIN and has a legit potential buyer for it.

Just makes me sick how people can do this and I'm willing to bet that these people are doing this on their own and not renting from anybody on Craigslist, or any other site.

[LVAllen]

Yea, that sucks, but what do you want the court to do? Assume the claimed tenants are lying before giving them a chance to present their case?

[MediocreButArrogant]

Originally Posted by tiger08

Just makes me sick how people can do this and I'm willing to bet that these people are doing this on their own and not renting from anybody on Craigslist, or any other site.

If you read farther down in the article, they were already thrown out of another house for doing the same thing. They are scammers who've figured out how to game the system.

Dietz (homeowner) suspects Barber (squatter) is not the victim of a scam artist who sold her a bogus lease. Barber and her family were discovered in a house on Weenap Street months before they appeared in Dietz's home on Starcrest.

“I asked her who she was. She said, ‘I'm the new tenant.' I told her, ‘no you're not. I'm the landlord and you're not my tenant,'” landlord of the Weenap Street home Wilma Littleford said.

The landlord said Barber had a bogus lease for the Weenap house as well.

[ddrhazy]

This news team was able to find out that this family has done this twice in the Valley now. Judge Cruz MUST expedite the summary eviction and should contact the DA and ask for charges to be issued for trespass/burglary/fraud.

This issue will continue to pop up and the only option for landlords is vigilance to make sure squatters are found out about right away and dealt with as quickly as possible.

Perhaps there were certain things about the house that made it an easy target that other landlords can try to avoid. Mr. Dietz's property didn't have the front yard landscaped and that might have played a part in why he was targeted.

[ddrhazy]

Originally Posted by MediocreButArrogant

If you read farther down in the article, they were already thrown out of another house for doing the same thing. They are scammers who've figured out how to game the system.

The court's clerks should start checking all defendants names to see if they've done this in the past. If they're newcomers to the town their fraud will not be exposed but in this case, all it took was a simple check on https://www.clarkcountycourts.us/Anonymous/default.aspx for me to see the other court case that the article was talking about.

I also wonder how the utilities were shut off. Did Dietz put a padlock on all the utility meters? If Dietz merely called the utility company and discontinued service, he is under no obligation to restart service in his name as he's following Nevada law. Is the judge asking him to start service again in his name?

[BBMW]

If the county/state is recording deeds, they should create a mechanism for renters to confirm that the owners of properties are in fact the landlord stated on the lease, and that the signatory is indeed the owner (or a verifiable representative.) The result of this process would be a receipt given to the tenant, that the lessor is in fact valid. If they then want to claim they have a lease, for the purpose of fighting an eviction, they have to show this receipt. If they don't, the lease in considered invalid, and they get summarily evicted.

[ddrhazy]

Originally Posted by BBMW

If the county/state is recording deeds, they should create a mechanism for renters to confirm that the owners of properties are in fact the landlord stated on the lease, and that the signatory is indeed the owner (or a verifiable representative.) The result of this process would be a receipt given to the tenant, that the lessor is in fact valid. If they then want to claim they have a lease, for the purpose of fighting an eviction, they have to show this receipt. If they don't, the lease in considered invalid, and they get summarily evicted.

I suggested something similar in tiger's thread about squatters. It would require training all the renters(let's say half a million) to start utilizing a database. The hurdles preventing creation of such a system are education/advertising and cost to build and maintain the database.

[BBMW]

The system would cost something to set up. There has to be some sort of property ownership database already, so it can just link into that.

Require brokers/Landlords to hand out a flier.

Originally Posted by ddrhazy

I suggested something similar in tiger's thread about squatters. It would require training all the renters(let's say half a million) to start utilizing a database. The hurdles preventing creation of such a system are education/advertising the system and cost to build and maintain the database.

[ddrhazy]

Originally Posted by BBMW

The system would cost something to set up. There has to be some sort of property ownership database already, so it can just link into that.

Require brokers/Landlords to hand out a flier.

The argument is that con artists pretending to be landlords/property managers would never educate a tenant/victim to utilize the system. There is the assessor's database which shows the owner of the property. Sometimes the owner is an LLC or is out of state who's contact info is impossible to get.

I would like to see the lease agreement the defendant in this case brought to court. She says someone named "Summers" rented to her. Did this imaginary Mr. Summers put in contact info? Making up a name is one thing, making a name attached to a phone # is slightly harder. But it seems the judge didn't do enough detective work to find if there was fraud here. If it comes out she was lazy, I'll vote for her opponent come November.