In New York City, a grandson found his mother’s dead body, beaten by squatters, in an apartment of his recently deceased grandmother. In Atlanta, an Army officer away serving on active duty had her home possessed by a convicted drug dealer. In Jacksonville, a property owner had a brick thrown at her car by two squatters who had moved into her rental home. They did $40,000 worth of damage before being finally removed by police.
Squatters are invading temporarily unoccupied homes across the country. Atlanta realtors estimate that 1,200 homes and apartments are illegally occupied in that metro area.
These squatters are essentially thieves and have developed sophisticated ways of discovering temporarily unoccupied targets, including reading obituaries and invading the homes of those who have recently died, scanning Zillow for homes that have been on the market for longer than a couple weeks, and renting an apartment through Airbnb and then stay past their welcome.
Like the flood of illegal immigrants crossing our southern border, squatters are gaming the system. They know that in most states, evicting someone from a property is a civil matter that requires hiring a lawyer, filing a suit, and often going to trial before a judge. This can take weeks and often months. All that time, the squatters live rent-free and often inflict substantial damage on a property they have no right to be in or any intention of making their stable home.
Some states, such as California, Illinois, and New York, have made the problem worse for homeowners by passing tenant protection laws that allow squatters to stay. In New York, if squatters can prove they have lived at an address for 30 consecutive days, no matter how they came to possess it, the owners are forbidden from changing the locks or shutting off utilities.
This is why Adele Andaloro got arrested, for changing the locks on her dead parents’ $1 million home in Queens. After her parents died, squatters moved in before Andaloro could sell the property, and squatters called the police and had her arrested when she tried to change the locks on this property that was hers. She is now suing the squatters in civil court, which could take six months.
As in so many other areas of policy, Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) has taken the lead with laws to close loopholes and restore order to residential neighborhoods. The Florida House and Senate recently passed legislation that allows property owners to file a complaint with the local sheriff’s office where a property is located. Once it is determined that the complainant does own the property, the sheriff must remove the unlawful occupants that day.
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Sheriffs are compensated by the complainant for their time, and complainants are liable civilly for wrongful use of this new process (for example, if a court later determines the occupants had a valid lease on the property).
It is unfortunate that civil society has sunk to such a low that Florida’s new property rights law is necessary. Homeowners should be able to go on vacation, serve their country, or rent out their property without fear that squatters will sneak in and trash the place. Kudos to Florida for doing something about the flagrant abuse of our court system. Now, if only Congress, or the Supreme Court, would let states take similar actions against illegal immigrants.