I accidentally bought a meth lab | Hacker News Reader

I accidentally bought a meth lab

change.org

54 pointsJeremyMorgan35 comments

While this is an absolutely heart breaking and terrible story, there is a part of this that makes me cringe:

Freddie Mac won't take any responsibility for misleading us about the safety of our home, and attorneys just tell us that we should've read the fine print.

Buying a home, or making any significant purchase is always going to come with "fine print." Make sure you read your contracts, always. If you are buying a home that seems to good to be true, it probably is and you should hire a reputable inspector to find out why. If you don't feel you're up to the task, hire someone to check the fine print for you. I'd be interested to know what fine print they ignored before deciding to make their decision.

This petition offends me because it omits some important facts, namely the couple bought a foreclosure...

See http://www.heraldandnews.com/members/news/frontpage/article_...

I helped a friend through a foreclosure recently, and throughout the process you sign and are told MULTIPLE times that the house is "as-is." These people should have inspected. You get what you pay for, and I'm sorry they are out 36k, but this is no different than buying a new ferrari from a used car dealer for 10k and asking ferrari to send you a new engine.

From the article: "They found a couple of smashed windows, and knew they’d have to put some work into it, he said. A handout from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency informed them they were responsible for detecting asbestos, lead paint or other common health hazards associated with older homes."

Also interesting from the article and not in the petition:

>Sold for a song at $36,000, the two-bedroom, single-story home is about the only rough spot on a street of clean and tidy homes.

[...]

>The Hankins now will be stuck with the cost of remediation, which one contractor said costs $5,000 to $8,000 or more

Seems to me that $41,000-43,000 is still a pretty good price for a two-bedroom home, about $10k down from the average in the area according to Trulia.

So the full story is that they explicitly bought a house as-is, found an $8000 problem with it, and decided to start a petition and move out.

I'd agree that there should be a better database of convicted meth distributors/manufacturers and the homes they used for their operations, but then why not push for that kind of regulation at the state level rather than within one company? Especially if the "most important" part of your petition is to make sure "that this doesn't happen to one more family".

This petition offended me long before that. It was today's lucky SPAM email from change.org. Sheesh... you sign one petition with them... and SPAM!

Did these people even view the house before they bought it?

I'm gonna guess that the fine print was more along the lines of "we're not responsible for what happened before this" than "we're not responsible for leftover meth byproducts."

Sure, you could say that these people should hire someone to test for chemicals in the air, but how wealthy do you expect people who purchase a home that used to be a meth lab?

I'm just saying that it's not quite so simple as reading the fine print.

Actually, the fine print probably just said "due diligence" is the buyer's responsibility and the property doesn't come with a seller's disclosure.

[edit] Which by the way, is all the seller should have to say in this situation. See my full opinion below.

> the property doesn't come with a seller's disclosure.

Which is probably a standard clause for a foreclosure? If he bought it from a bank, it's almost certainly a foreclosure.

Foreclosures can be a great deal, they can also turn out to be a horrible investment.

He should have hired an inspector. He should have done it even if it wasn't a foreclosure. An inspector should be somebody you find. Not your lawyer, not your real-estate agent. You. They're the only person in the process looking after your interests. They inspect many homes and know exactly what to look for. You don't.

At the end of the day, this is 100% his fault, but what's done is done.

I would pressure the bank's real-estate agent. They really don't want to be known for selling meth labs ... and they probably have contacts on the inside.

They might arrange for the bank to pay for the necessary clean-up, if such a thing is even possible.

And even if it didn't, buyers should always get a home inspected before finalizing.

I do feel terrible for what this family is going through. I hope people take their story as a warning to perform due diligence themselves.

I've hired two home inspectors in my lifetime, and none of them even suggested they were even capable of testing for meth byproducts. Is this really a service anyone sells?

> Most importantly, we want Freddie Mac to start regularly testing the homes it sells for meth contamination, just like it would for lead paint.

I seriously doubt they test for lead paint.

While the laws vary by state, I know that landlords and owners around here have every incentive not to test, because if they test and find lead they have expensive obligations (made more expensive by a cumbersome lead-abatement licensing system).

Whereas if they just include a letter saying "we don't know the lead status", they're legally in the clear.

Lead paint is pretty easy to figure out, though.

Lead paint was banned in the US in 1978. If the house was built before or around that time(say, up until 1980), it's a good idea to test before purchasing.

However, if it was built in the late 80's or 90's, there's practically no chance of lead paint in the house.

> we thought it was too good to be true. It turned out that it was.

I don't know about everyone else, but I understood this lesson by the time that I was ten years old.

I'd be curious as to what price differential this guy got on his house.

I'd also be curious to see whether testing supports his assertion that there are hazardous chemicals still present. It might very well be true...or it might be wildly exaggerated.

This is the internet; I've seen both.

What an odd read. There's a lot of things that you need to research before purchasing a home. I don't think we should require everyone to test a house for meth before selling it. Really, argon testing would make more sense as it's much more common, but even that I would disagree with.

Just off the top of my head there is:

- Asbestos

- Radon, methane, and, and other hazardous gases

- Lead Paint

- Structural issues

- Grade/drainage issues

- Flood/tornado/some other natural disaster zone

- Water contamination (for wells)

- Termites and other pests

- etc.. etc...

Typically, there's a seller's disclosure that's provided with a property that basically states that if the owner is aware of anything, they should inform the buyer. Foreclosures and certain types of investment properties don't come with this, because, well technically the seller wouldn't be aware of anything in most cases. It's standard procedure. If there is any complaint to be made here, it might be one of willful negligence on the part of FM, but again, it says right there in the contract and the listing: do your due diligence... no seller's disclosure provided. I've seen foreclosures much worse than this one.

Really, due diligence should be the buyer's responsibility and if they want the seller to pay for any testing, it should be put it in the contract. Again, if FM knew about this ahead of time, I'm sure there are already laws in place to protect the buyer. If FM didn't know, then no one is at fault. It's just a freak thing and stuff like this happens.

Just some minor quibbles...

You probably mean radon testing, not argon, as I don't believe argon is radioactive.

One can make an educated guess about lead paint without a test. If your house is old enough, it's there. If it's there, it's probably been painted over multiple times. So just wear a mask if you're stripping walls or doing structural work there, and don't let pregnant women or children anywhere near the work area.

What is this doing on the front page of Hacker News? If I correctly understand the thoughtful comments already posted here, the story is old, every buyer of a house sold under those low-price conditions has the same risk from any seller (and thus should inspect the house before buying), and there isn't even any proof of significant harm. If I discover that my car needs repair before the next scheduled dealer maintenance, am I going to post a petition on change.org and then have a link to that petition on the front page of Hacker News? This is at best a TV news kind of story (from some undetermined previous time, with most of the journalistic who, what, when, where, and why details omitted), and the Hacker News guidelines

http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

say "If they'd cover it on TV news, it's probably off-topic."

This is a sad story, I don't wish this on anybody. Having bought a house not long ago, I know what a complicated, drawn-out and stressful process it is. I can't imagine what's it's like to deal with a foreclosed property. The fine print is overwhelming, but it's there for a reason. But, I find it a little disconcerting that people will believe and sign anything with such limited information, especially ones that pull at heart strings...

I find it disconcerting that people who are so good at pulling heart strings would believe and sign anything with such limited information.

It makes me want to protect my heart strings more.

I wish this provided a bit more information on the case at hand. I'm guessing that no one suspected a meth lab had been there and thus no testing was ever done. After all, the family did buy the house and so it must have at least looked safe/appealing.

The bank almost certainly hired people to clean the place and make it pretty for sale. This is only to be expected - everyone cleans a place they are going to sell. If those people cleaned out a whole weird chemistry setup, they should be forced to at least disclose and hopefully test, but that will depend on jurisdiction. If the previous owners cleared out all obvious signs, which might well be expected given that leaving a trail could lead to criminal charges, then it is hard to say - meth contamination may or may not be common enough to merit checking always, I really don't have the data.

Does a standard home inspection catch things like this? I've purchased homes, and always had an inspection done, but never watched them actually 'inspect.' Curious if they use detection devices for things like this.

Also, how does the government get involved in the backing of contaminated homes. I know that as a VA borrower, the requirements are very strict. Isn't it the same here?

I've watched a home inspection and the only tools used were a flashlight, GFI tester to test wiring, and the guy's eyeballs. Unless there's some visible sign, a typical home inspector is not going to be able to detect chemical contamination of any kind. Radon testing before buying a home isn't uncommon but is still something you have to ask for and pay for separately.

And even then it still isn't performed often enough because radon tests take a solid week or more (for the activated-charcoal kind).

And a good radon test uses film and takes months since the release of the gas is seasonal.

Nope. Home inspectors aren't allowed to be "intrusive" while testing, meaning they can only see stuff that's easily accessible.

I don't think this is a standard thing that you would find in a home so it probably wouldn't be part of a standard home inspection. Things like mold which are more prevalent would be higher on the list of priorities. They could however easily test for specific chemicals used in meth cooking if desired.

IMO, the vast majority of home inspectors are people looking for an easy income. All the "certified home inspector" label means is that they crammed for a few days to pass the test.

This story is about 10 years old BTW. If Feddie Mac hasn't changed their policies in that time I don't think they're going to now.

Where do you get your info that this is 10 years old? It seems they moved in June 2012.

Being on the Change.org mailing list, I signed this petition. Lately, though, I've come to ignore the mass emails the organization sends out. This story is definitely sad and the writer and his family deserves justice, but no less than most other petitions on that site. I wonder why this story garnered more interest in me, and on HN, as well.

Could they not use the title insurance route to get this cleared up? That is if they have title insurance which I think is provided to everyone. They could check the HUD and verify if they paid for it.

Does meth invalidate title? How would title insurance help?

Would homeowner's insurance cover it? I'd bet the bank has homeowner's insurance on the house.

Did Freddie Mac know this was a former meth lab or not?

I just signed the petition. I think you should too. I just feel for this guy. I am a new homeowner myself.

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