Seattle woman lives in multi-million dollar home, whicle receiving welfare

[Racket_Man]

But you can't just sell a house in this market. You'd lose thousands due to having to sell it below value.

But if you are on public assistance then a million dollar home could still sell well enough to support you for a long long time even at a deflated price.... well assuming its already paid for.

If they are so bad off then a smaller house would be better anyway. Less taxes, lower upkeep etc.

you know the one thing that I have not seen discussed yet ----- HOW in the world is this person paying their property taxes on said property?????? if this IS indeed a near million dollar house with a nice chunk of land the porperty taxes alone (depending on the location) would be in the upper 4 or lower 5 figure range at the very least.

Now IF she is just staying at this house (non owner) OK I get that. BUT if she ownes the house, where is the tax money coming from?????

[bara]

you know the one thing that I have not seen discussed yet ----- HOW in the world is this person paying their property taxes on said property?????? if this IS indeed a near million dollar house with a nice chunk of land the porperty taxes alone (depending on the location) would be in the upper 4 or lower 5 figure range at the very least.

Now IF she is just staying at this house (non owner) OK I get that. BUT if she ownes the house, where is the tax money coming from?????

She is renting the house.. or thats her claim. They beleive her husband owns the house and they raided the house to find proof.

[Panacea]

Yes but we aren't saying give up your nice cars and your nice home we are saying give up your luxurious car that is worth two nice cars and your house the same.

Well, let's think about that for a minute. I know I did, on my way to work this morning (don't know why, it just popped into my head).

When you buy a car, you have a loan. Title is held by the financing company. Which means, if you want to sell the car, you have to have their OK if it won't pay off the loan . . . or they won't grant a new lien to the new owner.

The economy is bad. Which means these people might not be ABLE to pay off their fancy car or to sell it to get out from under it. They have to have transportation. So they hang on to it, and try to cut other expenses to keep the car, or hide it from the repo man as long as they can't (which isn't forever).

Many people get more car than they can afford via leases. If they try to break the lease (which usually costs less than a regular loan payment), they may still owe the balance if the car can't be rented right away, just like with an apartment.

Every time the price of gas shoots up, I see pick up trucks and luxury vehicles on the side of the road with for sale signs on them. Some people ARE trying to sell their cars. They may just not be having any luck.

Consider one of our members, Imogene (hasn't been on for awhile). She cut ties with her family and was trying to get to New York. She had no job, literally no money, and a car whose payments she could no longer make. She got a lot of pressure from the members (including me) to sell the car, turn it in or leave it for the repo man. She couldn't . . . for the reasons I highlight above. She was screwed no matter what she did.

I think we may be doing people a disservice when we get frustrated at folks with nice cars showing up at the food bank. Most are not sucky or scammers.

Look at the behavior, not the car.

you know the one thing that I have not seen discussed yet ----- HOW in the world is this person paying their property taxes on said property?????? if this IS indeed a near million dollar house with a nice chunk of land the porperty taxes alone (depending on the location) would be in the upper 4 or lower 5 figure range at the very least.

If she has a mortgage, then property taxes are rolled into the mortgage payment. The mortgage company sets up an escrow account, and part of your monthly payment goes into it each month (it is an interest bearing account, not that you get much these days), and once a year the bank sends the money off to the state for you. You're not actually responsible for paying property taxes yourself until the house is paid off.

But like someone else said, she's a "renter."

[HYHYBT]

She is renting the house.. or thats her claim. They beleive her husband owns the house and they raided the house to find proof.

Interesting. Property records are normally kept by the government, are they not? Same for marriage licenses. They shouldn't have to go to the house to find out either who owns it or who that person is married to.

[Panacea]

Interesting. Property records are normally kept by the government, are they not? Same for marriage licenses. They shouldn't have to go to the house to find out either who owns it or who that person is married to.

The issue is the marriage. The state believes the woman and the doctor (chiropractor?) who is the land lord are actually married, which would make her ineligible for benefits (obviously). Trouble is, they're trying to prove it.

It could be a common law marriage, or it could be they were married in another state under different names.

There are 50 states, plus the territories, plus thousands of counties. Marriage licenses aren't always available online. It would be very easy for a married couple to pretend not to be to run this sort of scam. It's not just a simple matter of going to the courthouse in today's complicated society.

[Andara Bledin]

The state of California does not recognize common law marriages and hasn't for a long time. However, it could have been a private marriage, and I have no idea how that would affect legal issues such as the claiming of assistance.

^-.-^

[Panacea]

The state of California does not recognize common law marriages and hasn't for a long time. However, it could have been a private marriage, and I have no idea how that would affect legal issues such as the claiming of assistance.

^-.-^

Seattle's in Oregon.

However, I don't know if they recognize common law marriages, either.

[AdminAssistant]

Seattle's in Oregon.

....There may be a Seattle in Oregon, but I'm pretty sure they're talking about the one in Washington with all the grunge music and the Starbucks and the flying fish.

[Andara Bledin]

Seattle's in Oregon.

No matter whether Seattle's in Oregon or Washington, I clearly need to stop reading multiple threads at once. >_<

I don't know what else I was reading, but despite the very title telling me otherwise, I somehow thought the house was in San Francisco.

At least the city begins with the same initial...

^-.-^

[bara]

More info

So they both have lied, they are married. He put his residence down as his practice and she failed to disclose several bank accounts with a lot more money than I have.

So hopefully they burn. But I will settle with making them pay back every cent and then fining them just enough so they dont actually end up qualifying for assistance since that would be redundant.

[Panacea]

....There may be a Seattle in Oregon, but I'm pretty sure they're talking about the one in Washington with all the grunge music and the Starbucks and the flying fish.

Well, don't I look like an idiot!

Uhm. Yeah. Washington. I meant to say that!

[MrsEclipse]

Do you guys want to back up and try this again?

[bara]

I know this is dredging up an older thread, but since its the same thing... we have an update.
Nice to see. People who were actually abusing the system (of which there are far fewer than certain groups would have us believe get some jail time.

[guywithashovel]

Unfortunately, circumstances like this are often used to say no one should ever get any kind of public assistance.

However, I've found that people who complain about how awful it is that we have public assistance usually change their tune pretty quickly if they suffer a job loss or fall into some other circumstance where they need assistance to get by.