Thursday, February 7, 2008 | by nathan

The Shitbox Next Door

Brian and I love our house. It’s probably one of our favorite things about our life. When you see someone interviewed on television after they’ve lost their house to, say, a major storm or earthquake, the thing they always say is that it’s not just a house. It’s a home. It’s the pulsing center of your whole life. That’s true for us.

We moved into this house at the end of September. 2005. We immediately fell in love with living where we live, because it’s urban and cool, it’s close to things like Oklahoma City’s Asian District and Paseo areas, and unlike a few of the nearby areas, people genuinely care about the upkeep and exterior appearance of their homes. This helps property values. It helps the overall mood of the neighborhood.

And then - there were the people next door.

First off, I have to say, they were incredibly nice. A friendly, middle-aged couple with two teenage daughters, they’d lived in the neighborhood for 15 years and knew everyone. I genuinely liked them, I liked their kids. I hated their dogs, but I eventually even grew to live with that. We all got along well enough despite the fact that they almost never mowed their grass, the paint was peeling on their house, the shutters were falling away from their grody windows. We knew that they spent a lot of money sending their girls to excellent private schools, and they worked a lot, so we didn’t bug them about it.

We did report them to the city when they left a car, tires flat, leaking oil, in their driveway for months. I felt awful, but it had to be done.

Then, last year, Brian and I went away to San Francisco for a week. When we returned, the neighbors seemed to have vanished. At first we figured it was an extended vacation, but after several weeks we still hadn’t seen them. Neighbors reported that they’d show up, occasionally, and fill the back of their car with belongings, then leave again for days at a time. Once, Brian saw them pull up, go inside, get a LIVE CAT, and then leave once more.

Finally the rumblings turned to murmurs; some of the neighbors had spoken to them, and found out they were having some money problems and were looking to get out from under their mortgage.

I called my friends Jaye and Laurie, who had long wanted to move into our neighborhood. They came over and we stood, staring at the seemingly abandoned house, for several hours in the July heat, thinking. How great would it be if they could move in next door to us? The house was in a great neighborhood, and big enough for them to start planning a family. It’d need some work, sure, but we’d all pitch in like some crazy hippie commune meets Trading Spaces. All would be right with the world. We just needed to see the inside.

Finally, we did see the inside. Late, late one night, we went in through an unlocked door. I’m not proud of it, but after weeks of absenteeism, the neighbors seemed to have vanished for good.

The first thing that hit us was the smell: mold, dust, and cat pee. There were holes in the floor. A pipe had burst in the upstairs bathroom and soaked through the kitchen ceiling. There were maggots in the refrigerator. Who lives like this? Who lives like this with their kids?

We poked around for quite some time, and for the next two days I was out sick, the mold was so bad inside. Our hopes dashed, everyone decided that having the places inspected was the next logical step. We got in touch with the neighbors, who were excited at the prospect, and Jaye & Laurie shelled out $150 for an inspector to come out. He told them the place was actually in good shape, just uncared-for. Talks of offers began drifting through the late-summer air. We thought it might happen, and it was time for my dear friends to start thinking seriously. They researched loans that would let them borrow capital to fix up the house; it was absolutely, completely possible.

Then - wham. The house went on foreclosure. Turned out my neighbors hadn’t paid their mortgage for some time. Within a month the house was set to go on sheriff’s auction. So much for that. Another sad story of today’s awful housing market, another foreclosure. The stuff in the news hits home.

Jaye went to the auction and reported that the house was bought, sight unseen, for 1.5 times what he had planned to offer, and at least that much more than what it was worth, in its current condition.

I met the buyers; they were nice, and seemed to have a real plan for how they were going to fix up the house. Also, the wife had breast cancer.

At first they were there a lot, fixing things up, trying to get projects done. As it got colder we saw less of them. Some contractors came to fix the roof; I stepped on one of the nails they’d left in the driveway. A few guys were there last week but from what we can tell they did nothing. We haven’t seen the actual owners in probably five months.

Though we won’t know until the end of March, we expect that the foreclosure on the property will hit our property values. The fact that the place is an unmitigated, rotting shitbox probably isn’t helping either. I’ve been reluctant to report some of the flagrant disregard of city ordinances because - how do you report someone with BREAST CANCER for not mowing their grass? It just seems so wrong and soulless somehow, but also, I’m really super sick and tired of having this horribly ugly house next to me, especially when it could be something nice. It could be a great property. There’s nothing structurally wrong with the place, and the floor plan is excellent. The yard, with love, could be wonderful.

It goes back to a struggle I always have - patience and kindness versus boundaries. I want to be kind and patient, but I’ve also learned - the hard way - that it’s important to set boundaries, to not let people walk on you. So I’m left to ponder what the hell - if anything - to do about the shitbox next door.