Originally Posted By wa6oqc I think that she is doing some good by bulldozing the house and building a new house. Look at all of the construction workers who now have a job that they would not have had if she didn't.
Originally Posted By mele My first thought when I heard this story was that I wondered if the house had a severe mold problem. But I live in the PNW so mold is always an issue. Instead of being outraged, we could think of the jobs building a new house will provide. (And, yes, I usually groan when people say stuff like this.) I dunno...it's something, I guess (instead of just feeling crappy about the whole situation).
Originally Posted By skinnerbox <<My first thought when I heard this story was that I wondered if the house had a severe mold problem. But I live in the PNW so mold is always an issue.>> That was my first thought as well. It was built in 1932, right next to the ocean. I lived in Florida for three years, and was ill most of the time, because of my mold allergies. It was everywhere, and impossible to completely eliminate. Old housing sitting next to the ocean in hurricane country is ripe for water damage and mold contamination.
Originally Posted By mele It wasn't a perfectly good home. <a href="http://www.palmbeachpost.com/news/home-donations-from-tigers-ex-wife-aid-habitat-2085291.html" target="_blank">http://www.palmbeachpost.com/n...291.html</a>
Originally Posted By RoadTrip <<Wow, what a misogynistic comment, Trippy. I'm disappointed in you, man. It is not the wife's fault if her husband cheated on her.>> Sorry... it was meant to be a comment in jest. I just can't take the troubles of rich people very seriously. On the other hand, how many rock stars, movie stars, sports stars, etc. remain faithful? It doesn't justify it, but it shouldn't be a big surprise to anyone either.
Originally Posted By Goofyernmost Well...that just shows ta go ya...there usually is more to the story! In this political year it might be really good advice for all of us. Never accept the first thing you hear, you might have missed some important parts of the picture.
Originally Posted By wahooskipper I'm so sick of being judged in here it makes me want to puke. I'm not "buying into and right wing hyperbole" by pointing out that there are poor who are there because of their own damn laziness. Did I say it was a lot of poor? No. But I also don't think a lot of the rich are ignorant or selfish as this orginal post was intended to point out. (And, in this case...there was more to the story.) Heck I have middle class friends that I would say are as much a part of today's financial problems as any rich who don't want to give up more of their income to taxes. I know more couples than I wish I did who have just stopped making an attemp to pay their mortgages and are just hoping they don't get evicted. And, THEY are to blame because they shouldn't have been in those homes to begin with. Any reasonable person could figure out that they couldn't afford those homes...even if the bank said they could. I was presented with similar information and urged to buy more than I could afford...and I didn't. I stand by my statement that it is popular to blame our ills on the rich right now. It is easy to do and allows us to not be introspective and see that there is a LOT of personal responsibility (or lack thereof) to blame.
Originally Posted By wahooskipper Let me change my comments slightly. I'm not sick of being judged...I think I'm sick of being judged incorrectly.
Originally Posted By SingleParkPassholder "She should have got a Holmes Inspection before she bought the house." LOL. This really did make me laugh out loud, because it's true.
Originally Posted By Kar2oonMan I stand corrected. Mele's post points out that the home was in bad shape afterall, so my apologies for jumping to conclusions. I was wrong.
Originally Posted By Kar2oonMan Note to self: Remember to wait a little while before assuming the worst. Remember what Felix Unger taught you about assuming. <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tKlWGZHEO7Q" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v...WGZHEO7Q</a>
Originally Posted By mele Who says she didn't have the home inspected? Even an inspection can't find all of the damage w/o ripping the house to the bones. Sometimes people think that a home is damaged when they buy it but learn that it's too far gone to change it in the way they had planned. There is no proof that Elin didn't get this property inspected, nor do you know what was in her mind when she purchased it or what she and the previous owners agreement was. It has to be pointed out, apparently, that the property in this neighborhood is easily worth what she paid for it. You know the old saying "location, location, location"??? Some pieces of land in that area are smaller and are priced even higher WITHOUT any dwellings. I've read that property was worth $12 million and the house worth $500,000. (Not sure if that is true but, if you own property, you know that the two are valuated separately.) But, let's get this straight...that was NOT a $12 million dollar house. Knowing the location makes this an absolute fact. She paid for the property. (Well, unless the previous owner just thought she was so adorable that he knocked off half of the $24 million dollar price!) Ever try to bring an old, damaged house up to code? (Jesus, ever try to remodel a normal house? State/City/County codes can be brutal!) Ever try to newly insure an older house, with possibly harmful building supplies? How about a house that has any sort of damage from mold, termites, etc? Do you know how much that can cost (IF a company will even give you insurance?) Ever been in a house that seems beautiful but actually has a huge mold problem which can't be seen? (I lived in a brand new house that looked nice but was incredibly shoddily built. Even the one of the construction workers I met later LAUGHED about how cheap it was.) Ever known anyone with severe mold allergies? Mold can literally be DEADLY. Not because it looks ugly but can be invisible to the eye and inhaled. It's also expensive to remove from homes. She should have to live in a damaged home why exactly? She should, perhaps, make a big statement to the world about choosing living in a damaged home to make people feel better? She should NOT create jobs by spending her money by creating a sturdy, healthy home for her children? How stupid and condescending would that be for her to do this? Not to mention, how possibly dangerous for her children. She bought the house for the property. Do you really think anyone who cared about their health OR their finances would have lived in a house that was so damaged? Maybe the previous owner of the house should have donated a severely damaged house (and multi-million dollar property) to homeless people to live in? Or, perhaps no one should ever live on that property again just to save a house that would cost millions to repair. But, by some people's logic, the 99% might be offended by such extravagant spending so, we're back to the property owner either living in a severely damaged house, letting homeless people live in the house or nobody living there. Yeah, that seems logical. Reading people's comments on other forums has been enlightening about why people are so outraged by her actions. They seem to think she's flagrantly spending this money (although, it's really the media that broke this "news".) They think she stole Tiger's money and, now that she's shown herself to be such a turd for tearing down her termite ridden house, she deserved to be cheated on. She's just a gold-digging nanny who stole poor Tiger's money and now she's going to blow through it while laughing at all of the poor people in the world. Hell, she might keep building and tearing down like that batty Winchester lady. What a pig she is. Seriously...what should have been done with the damaged home? And which morally deserving individual will be good enough to make those decisions?
Originally Posted By mele Yikes...I clearly missed some posts before going off on my screed. Sorry about that. LOL
Originally Posted By Goofyernmost All I can say is it takes a big Kar2oonman to admit that he was wrong. Welcome out of the pit of scorn and back to the warm fuzzys where you belong.
Originally Posted By skinnerbox Thanks for post #34, mele. Very well written explanation of housing problems that plague all levels of income in this country. In fact, mold is one of those major problems that isn't getting enough attention, particularly with aging infrastructure in public buildings, such as schools and courthouses, as well as aging commercial property and residential rental property, and newer buildings constructed on the cheap. These buildings are not being properly maintained to keep toxic mold out when water damage occurs. And with a lack of regular maintenance to keep water damage from happening, through rotting roofs, leaking plumbing, and lack of ventilation, mold springs up and spreads in areas hidden from view, and goes undetected until most of the building's inhabitants become seriously ill. And even then, good luck trying to get a greedy landlord or local municipality to do the proper inspection to find the mold. They don't want to find the mold because they don't want to spend the bucks needed to remove it. So they will fight tooth-and-nail in court to keep from doing the responsible thing to maintain healthy environments for their tenants, be them residential or commercial, or for school kids and citizens who must inhabit public buildings on a regular basis. Environmental illness is real. It's not quackery. And it's becoming more and more of a problem. I was tested at a very early age for mold allergies, and was found to be severely allergic. Most people don't fall into this category, but adults often become allergic later in life after years of exposure as kids in moldy aging schools. And once your body develops this allergy, it doesn't go away. You cannot desensitize against mold spores and the biotoxins they create as a survival mechanism against other molds. That's how they survive, by pushing out other molds with a toxic byproduct that's usually toxic to us, especially the 'slime molds' such as stachybotrys. And stach is on the rise, as more and more old construction is allowed to stand without repairs, and as new construction continues to focus on "energy efficiency" by restricting airflow and eliminating proper ventilation.
Originally Posted By Kar2oonMan Unfortunately, I was sucked into a Yahoo news headline, which are, by design, almost always over the top and incendiary. Shame on me for getting pulled in by that. Better to wait a beat and read more about it.
Originally Posted By RoadTrip <<Who says she didn't have the home inspected? Even an inspection can't find all of the damage w/o ripping the house to the bones.>> Termites always leave very visible signs of their presence... little mud tubes leading from the ground and across the cement foundation to where they enter the home. Any competent home inspector should notice the evidence... especially in Florida where termites are very common. I'm going with the "bought it for the location" theory.
Originally Posted By wahooskipper Funny thing is, if you've ever driving up or down A1A in Southeast Florida you would see it is so common as to be boring the number of times million dollar homes are purchased and torn down to make way for multi-million dollar homes. It happens over in the Ft Myers/Naples area regularly too. But, the owners aren't typically people who beat the crap out of Tiger Woods.
