The Curious Case of 88 Lafayette Avenue
If townhouse prices in Fort Greene are down 50 percent, then someone forgot to send us the memo. Which is why the recent sale of 99 Lafayette Avenue for $850,000 caught our attention. You see, this four-story building changed hands for $1,700,000 as recently as July 2007. It also traded in 2005 for $975,000 and…
If townhouse prices in Fort Greene are down 50 percent, then someone forgot to send us the memo. Which is why the recent sale of 99 Lafayette Avenue for $850,000 caught our attention. You see, this four-story building changed hands for $1,700,000 as recently as July 2007. It also traded in 2005 for $975,000 and in 2006 for $1,050,000. A lot of activity for one house. Odd, isn’t it?
88 Lafayette Avenue [StreetEasy] GMAP P*Shark
some interesting facts:
– narcarta holdings, which appears several times in the property shark transaction history is linked to Joyce, Don & Associates, 100% owned, at least in 2007, by Donna Daniels and Osmond Decoteau.
Decoteau is an indicted mortgage fraudster: http://www.usdoj.gov/usao/nye/pr/2008/2008oct23.html
– Narcarta was or is involved in real estate projects in Florida, including a multi-story, 42 units condominium project. In 2007, it filed, but was rejected for bankruptcy protection by the federal courts. The court didn’t like Daniels or Decoteau: http://pacer.flmb.uscourts.gov/pdf-new/57156812.pdf
– Narcarta also shows up in the mortgage history of 92 lafayette (which sold for $2.4 million! in 2006) and 885 sterling place (where daniels and one evis stephens, also appear)
– stillwater asset backed fund is known for vulnerability to straw buyer and equity stripping transactions.
Clear case of mortgage fraud.
Wacky! Hope someone pursues this, dying to find out.
It was at 950K when I “saw” it this summer. (For obvious
reasons, you can’t “look” at it like a regular wreck). Pierre is right: it’s missing more than the back wall. One of the websites I checked about the place this summer had a DOB violation that noted the back wall was missing a year ago. That note would coincide with the 1.7MM sale. There’s a story here.
Itsagas we suspect fraud as well.
It’s hardly even that. I looked at this house this summer the day after it was “listed” but I was told it was already spoken for. Good luck with that! It has no back wall whatsoever. And it’s been wide open for a while. Someone started to renovate and gutted the place; I don’t know if the removal of the back wall was deliberate or if it just fell down. Lots of violations. It keeps changing hands, but maybe people just get overwhelmed by the work needed and the labyrinth of violations and put it right back on the market.
I’m a single woman who has taken on the challenge of renovating five absolute wrecks in the past ten years, but this one was too much even for me!
Still, I sure hope it can be saved and was not bought just for the lot.
So was the $1,750,000 price a mortgage fraud?
We walk by this place daily and it is indeed only a shell with missing floors, windows and the roof is partially off. We even charted up the broker and backed off since the details appeared shady to say the least…then it was priced @ $950K.
Is it just a shell?