When former owners turn desperate and fraudulent

[Nick L.]

I have to rant about this somewhere and figure BPers would sympathize!

I bought a house at foreclosure auction this year. I've completed the process and have the deed. The tenant and the former owner (who apparently live together) both refuse to accept that I own it despite my deed and public records. I tried to reach a peaceful move-out agreement with them but they have been variously stalling me and belligerent. I have an eviction order pending execution by the sheriff's dept.

The former owner is a petty criminal who is trying various frauds to stall the eviction and make money off the house. The ones I know about so far are:

- Claiming the foreclosure is not valid because he filed BK the morning of the auction. I have paperwork showing he filed it months before and the property was exempted from protection.

- Claiming the foreclosure is not valid because he did not have a contract with the foreclosing bank, and is filing suit against them and me. Of course he cannot give me contact details for the several attorneys he claims to have, cannot provide me with paperwork, and refuses to contact my attorney. I used to feel bad for him for this one as he bought the house QC from the previous owner and I guess didn't realize he would inherit the debt.

- Filing a fraudulent contractor's lien for over $100k against the bank and me for supposed work done on the property

- Forging papers to show he took title to the property this year after the foreclosure auction.

- Advertising the property for rent on CL and trying to get thousands of dollars on the spot to secure it. I found out about this one because a potential victim spotted red flags and found me through public records.

The potential victim told me the house was packed up so I went over today to take  a look. I saw suitcases in the driveway so I wandered up to the kitchen window to see if it was empty. The tenant came out screaming at me and the former owner gave me some new BS about how the house was really his. I asked him to produce some paperwork and he asked me to wait a minute. Apparently he used that time to call the police. 

When the police arrived he told them I was harassing them about the house and had been peeking into his daughter's bedroom while she was changing. I told them the true situation. The former owner then produced the fraudulent deed to "prove" ownership. The police asked me for proof I own the house - of course I wasn't carrying the deed with me and they weren't interested in true ownership as it's a civil matter, so they sided with him and warned me for trespassing.

Hopefully it will only be a few days until the sheriff's department comes and physically removes the tenant and former owner. Of course that's more than enough time for them to defraud more CL renters and/or destroy the house. I'm also concerned that the former owner may harass me or future tenants. I bought the house through an LLC with a registered agent instead of my home address, but it wouldn't be hard to find my details with a little dedication.

My only consolation in all this grief is that I bought the house with enough margin to cover my lost rent, hefty legal bills and some vandalism repairs, and still come out ahead.

I'm not expecting any advice but let me know if you have some!