Double hit cure for cabin fever.......

[msinc]

Yesterday while suffering cabin fever {temp outside was about +15f, wind about 40mph, lead furnace was waiting for the new element to arrive and it's snowing this "cyclone c4 bomb blaster" storm.....the mail arrives. It's a large round package about 3 ft in diameter and it's addressed to my 18 year old daughter that just started college. It came from Switzerland and contained a very expensive infant gym, one of those things you set up like a kind of tent with a bunch of toys hanging from it so baby can lay in it and play and fill up it's diaper and puke all over the place....surprised at first, then while getting out of shock I decided to see if we were somehow billed for this mistake.
Nothing on the credit card online statement so we all have a laugh and conclude that it's just a simple mistake. Daughter is not expecting.
Then I catch a charge from about a month ago titled "alimony/child support" to a court in Virginia. While wifey is searching for a good divorce shyster I discover that of course the county where all this took place is one over from where my hunting cabin is 4 hours away!! Only my luck can be this bad!!
I call the place and they basically tell me I "have to come in to make a complaint, cant do it over the phone" and also that I have to call my local sheriff's dept. to get things started.
In the middle of all this my father-in-law shows up and says "it aint that speeding ticket thing I got back in the summer is it??" Seems the wife forgot she had to emergency pay with her card a ticket he got while traveling thru that area because he "forgot" to pay it on time and had one more day.
Why this showed up as alimony/child support is beyond me, but we had an interesting day to say the least. Cabin fever is gone!!!!

 

[Uthink Uknow]

Send me a check in the amount of $50.00 made out to "Cash" and I'll take on your speeding alimony case to the highest court in the land.. I'll PM my office address to you.

 

[msinc]

Send me a check in the amount of $50.00 made out to "Cash" and I'll take on your speeding alimony case to the highest court in the land.. I'll PM my office address to you.

Wow, you are pretty cheap...I just wrote a check to a lawyer for $8000.00 to handle a eminent domain thing....the county wants to take 35.5 acres off one of my farms for a runway extension at the municipal airport and they offered me $16,000.00 for it.

 

[Uthink Uknow]

I don't know what land is going for where the airport wants to buy but I'd have to say 35.5 acres for $16,000.00 is, are you ready?
"Cheap Dirt".

 

[js2013]

Wow, you are pretty cheap...I just wrote a check to a lawyer for $8000.00 to handle a eminent domain thing....the county wants to take 35.5 acres off one of my farms for a runway extension at the municipal airport and they offered me $16,000.00 for it.

Wow that stinks! Sounds like one of those "I'm from the government and I'm here to help you" moments. Good luck!

 

[snert]

Yesterday while suffering cabin fever {temp outside was about +15f, wind about 40mph, lead furnace was waiting for the new element to arrive and it's snowing this "cyclone c4 bomb blaster" storm.....the mail arrives. It's a large round package about 3 ft in diameter and it's addressed to my 18 year old daughter that just started college. It came from Switzerland and contained a very expensive infant gym, one of those things you set up like a kind of tent with a bunch of toys hanging from it so baby can lay in it and play and fill up it's diaper and puke all over the place....surprised at first, then while getting out of shock I decided to see if we were somehow billed for this mistake.
Nothing on the credit card online statement so we all have a laugh and conclude that it's just a simple mistake. Daughter is not expecting.
Then I catch a charge from about a month ago titled "alimony/child support" to a court in Virginia. While wifey is searching for a good divorce shyster I discover that of course the county where all this took place is one over from where my hunting cabin is 4 hours away!! Only my luck can be this bad!!
I call the place and they basically tell me I "have to come in to make a complaint, cant do it over the phone" and also that I have to call my local sheriff's dept. to get things started.
In the middle of all this my father-in-law shows up and says "it aint that speeding ticket thing I got back in the summer is it??" Seems the wife forgot she had to emergency pay with her card a ticket he got while traveling thru that area because he "forgot" to pay it on time and had one more day.
Why this showed up as alimony/child support is beyond me, but we had an interesting day to say the least. Cabin fever is gone!!!!

I bet THAT yanked you right out of any belly-button introspection and cabin fever induced daydreams!

 

[msinc]

I bet THAT yanked you right out of any belly-button introspection and cabin fever induced daydreams!

Yanked...yes sir, that is a good way of saying it!!!!

 

[C.E.Smith043]

Wow, you are pretty cheap...I just wrote a check to a lawyer for $8000.00 to handle a eminent domain thing....the county wants to take 35.5 acres off one of my farms for a runway extension at the municipal airport and they offered me $16,000.00 for it.

Put a pond in next to where they want to build, put an island in the middle of the pond and then litter the area with corn..... you'll have so many Canadian geese theres no way they'll send a plane in or out of there.....hehehe

 

[500Stroker]

You just cant find a good piece of rope when you really need one. LOL

 

[hogpatrol]

Settle your claim with a royalty fee on every takeoff and landing, say five bucks with a COLA clause, in perpetuity.

 

[dickn52]

Sell the 35 acres and open up a bird hunting lease on the rest. No pilot worth a damn will go near the place.

 

[msinc]

I don't know what land is going for where the airport wants to buy but I'd have to say 35.5 acres for $16,000.00 is, are you ready?
"Cheap Dirt".

Yes sir, the property is intended for what is known around here as "farmettes" which is basically a parcel of land 15 acres minimum and exempt from having to put in an engineered road. This is significant as a builder because if you have to do an engineered road that eats up so much of the profit that it's sometimes not worth developing the land...which is of course just what these communist liberal left wing democrats want. Currently in this area a farmette is typically bringing around $150 to $200,000 each.

 

[dickn52]

So where did they get the lowball number?

 

[msinc]

So where did they get the lowball number?

That's the same way I asked it!!! Lawyer is telling me, based on his experience with eminent domain takings...they go in to court as low as possible, I have to get an appraisal and generally what happens the jury splits it down the middle, so it's always in the govts. best interest to go in as low as possible. They actually did an appraisal too, but it was done by an out of state "eminent domain specialist" appraisal service out of West Virginia.
They didn't look at it as if it was two farmettes, they appraised it as if it was dead nothing unimproved property out in the woods, in total spite of the fact that half the acreage is currently a rock mine {commercial use}. Even at that rate, unimproved land around here goes for way more.

 

[dickn52]

That's the same way I asked it!!! Lawyer is telling me, based on his experience with eminent domain takings...they go in to court as low as possible, I have to get an appraisal and generally what happens the jury splits it down the middle, so it's always in the govts. best interest to go in as low as possible. They actually did an appraisal too, but it was done by an out of state "eminent domain specialist" appraisal service out of West Virginia.
They didn't look at it as if it was two farmettes, they appraised it as if it was dead nothing unimproved property out in the woods, in total spite of the fact that have the acreage is currently a rock mine {commercial}. Even at that rate, unimproved land around here goes for way more.

Usually fair market is based on the last 3 similar sales.

 

[JRS]

Wow, you are pretty cheap...I just wrote a check to a lawyer for $8000.00 to handle a eminent domain thing....the county wants to take 35.5 acres off one of my farms for a runway extension at the municipal airport and they offered me $16,000.00 for it.

I have a friend in Arizona who went through this, and it can get nasty. All states have the 5th Amendment on their side, and the government sends out an appraiser of their choosing. An experienced eminent domain attorney will prove to be worth his/her weight in gold.

 

[people]

Usually fair market is based on the last 3 similar sales.

Similar sales? I have personally seen those be as questionable as you can get. When they tried to reassess my farmstead for taxes they actually tried to tell me a sale 30 miles from me on a main road a much smaller house and farmstead was a comparable. All of the comparable where nothing like what I have. One was a trailer house. I did have to go to the public meeting to fight it. Long story short. I lost. I was able to not get the full tax raise put in place but, now they are raising my taxes 9.5% every year since then. At 10% they have to send you written notice.

 

[people]

I would fight it as best as you can. If you do not get what you want then yes I would get birds. I would not tell them that is your plan.

I would get birds now.

 

[Texas10]

Sell that acreage to a friend/business partner for 120K. That will set the value to the county.

 

[msinc]

Thanks for all the info and posts everyone. I have been a real estate investor for better than half my life, but I have never understood how they get away with this whole "appraisal" thing...ever notice how the appraisal always ends up just at the selling price when you have already agreed to buy something??? If you are the govt. that's doing the buying it is always ridiculously low, but when someone has to have it then it's always high???
An appraisal should be an appraisal and not waiver or be so inconsistent if we really are determining "fair" market value. I guess therein lies the question...who exactly are we being "fair" to??? It just seems like there can only be one fair market value. It's the same property, but there is always three.