Not everything that glitters is gold. ROI in Cleveland can be good, but Cleveland favors tenants and preventing homelessness over property rights and they do not like out of state investors because some have only extracted from the Cleveland market.
If you buy a rental property in Cleveland with defaulting (or soon to be defaulting) tenants, and the property is in disrepair, you may never be able to evict them. And we had one property with a water bill of over $600 a month that we were obligated to maintain while the eviction was in process. Best to avoid properties with tenants you haven't screened and to start with vacant properties if they need any work. The tenants can submit rent to the courts until you make all of the repairs before you see any rent...if you see any rent.
***Fake mortgages are being filed against properties in Cleveland and they are targeting out of state investors.
Our signature was forged as the "borrower" and the notary notarized the signature of the supposed lender-for $98,000. We were getting ready to close with an end buyer, but now we can't sell because of a fake mortgage that we are forced to legally remove with due process at our expense. How many people of thousands to throw at attorneys to defend property rights?
Cuyahoga County said they just record. Notary says they just notarize. Neither the county recorder or the notary reviews documents for validity or enforcement, they said.
We found out about the fake mortgage when reviewing title work in preparation of closing with an end buyer. No notice was sent to our office or any addresses for our LLC that owns the property. It's possible notice of the fake mortgage recording was just sent to the property and the tenants brushed it aside because it wasn't addressed to them.
Financial Crimes Unit for Cleveland has had the report for almost two months and the case has yet to even be assigned. They do not return phone calls and we aren't even sure they exist.
We have almost $3,000 into attorney fees so far and Cuyahoga County has blocked the emergency hearing so that we can all get on a call and kindly ask the fraudulent lien filer, Garrett Neal of San Diego (dba Neal Aviation), to please remove the mortgage lien. What a joke.
Garrett Neal filed the fake mortgage under an LLC, which was formed in Wyoming May 15th. The fake mortgage was filed under the LLC as the supposed lender earlier May 15th-before the company was even formed. The notary notarized the signature for fake lender LLC with no signing authority, resolutions....because the company didn't exist yet. The notary is in NJ and his name is Bipin Sabharwal. Bipin provided his log showing that the person signing started to sign my name, then crossed it out and signed as Garrett Neal. No red flags here???
We found Garrett Neal and called him and left a voice message. The returned phone call was a phone number associated with Neal Aviation out of San Diego and to that of Garrett Neal.
Garrett states that someone owes him money and he trying to get to the bottom of it, so he filed a fake mortgage, forged signatures and is now refusing to release it. We even explained that we had nothing to do with any loans or debts associated with him.
We found several other fake LLCs of Garrett's set up around the same time with names like Adios LLC, Adios G LLC, Adious LLC and similar names filed in Wyoming and Florida. The organizer information was left off of the other LLCs leaving other property owners to fight a ghost with additional fraudulent mortgages filed, it seems.
Garrett Neal is also a pilot listed on FAA website. Sounds like there are several unhappy customers of Neal Aviation (Garrett Neal is the owner of the company on record) for being sold bad parts and they're burning suppliers with hot checks for parts for privately owned aircraft (in their more recent business reviews).
I've been a real estate investor for almost twenty years and I never thought this was even possible, but here we are. Other investors may have seen a quitclaim deed filed where there were no mortgages or liens.
If we drafted a release and had it notarized and recorded, we'd be facing felonies for fraud.
