2 hours ago
1
A man has been praised for playing squatters at their own game after they took over his mother’s house.
Flash Shelton, a handyman from Nevada, California, explained in a YouTube video that his mum had put the property up for rent following the death of her husband. A woman subsequently got in touch to express her interest in becoming a tenant.
Flash said the woman, who claimed to be a prison guard, told them she didn’t have any money or credit, but hoped to fill the vacancy in exchange for making repairs and looking after the place.
Understandably, they rejected her application, but it turned out she was already on her way to the home with all her belongings.
Sign up for our free Indy100 weekly newsletter
“She ended up having a truck of furniture, and literally moved into the house,” Flash said, adding that she claimed her things had been delivered there “by accident”.
He said he started to hear from realtors, who were trying to list the house, that the place was full of furniture. Separately, he was told by neighbours that they could see lights on in the property at night.
In other words, the woman had truly made herself at home, without permission.
Flash took up the issue with the local sheriff’s office but they told him there was “nothing [they] could do".
“They said, ‘I’m sorry but we can’t enter the house, and it looks like they’re living there, so you need to go through the courts',” he recounted.
The handyman was left with no other choice but to take the matter into his own hands.
“All I needed to do at that point was do the same thing they did, and occupy the house,” he said.
“If they can take a house, I can take a house.”
Flash said that, since the house wasn’t in his name, his mother wrote up a lease agreement naming him as the property’s legal resident.
He then loaded up his Jeep, took his gun (“just in case”), and made the 12-hour drive up to the house in northern California.
The YouTuber explained that he arrived at the property at 4am but saw that there were cars in the driveway. Realising he “stood out like a sore thumb”, he parked a few houses down the street and slept in his car till morning.
At around 9am, he returned and saw that the cars were gone. “Taking a chance that everybody’s out”, he then entered the home using his keys.
After he spent some time looking around the house and feeling “shocked” at the amount of stuff that had been moved in, a woman and her granddaughter arrived.
Filming their encounter, Flash informed them that they needed to move their belongings out immediately, warning them that if they didn't do so by midnight that same day, he'd report them to police for trespassing.
The woman insisted she hadn't been living there – which Flash didn’t buy for a second – but, eventually, she agreed to vacate the property, which she did by 3am the following morning.
He went on to explain how realtors told him he could make “tons of money” from turfing squatters out of people’s homes, but he insisted he had no intentions of giving up his day job.
However, he admitted: “It was actually fun to do. I won’t lie about that."
Fellow YouTubers praised his "respectful" approach, with one writing: "I can't believe how calm you were through this. I don't think I could have been so nice."
Another commented: "They had money to buy nice furniture, rent a truck. They left in the morning like they had jobs. There were not homeless people. They should go to jail."
A third complained: "The fact that the law gives these squatters rights is totally INSANE! Clearly, our lawmakers can put laws in place to deal with squatters, but instead, they choose to put all types of laws in place to protect squatters and other non-payers!"
And a fourth added: "I give you all the credit. You stayed very calm, spoke to them like humans and got them out without incident."
Still, in a follow-up video, Flash told viewers not to follow in his footsteps, stressing: “Not everyone should walk through that door not knowing what you’re gonna find.
“It’s not always going to be peaceful like that.”
How I removed squatters in less than a day.www.youtube.com
This article was originally published on 26 March, 2023.
Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings
.jpg?mbid=social_retweet)
English (US) ·