4 ms·

I remember a holdout situation in my old home town that was resolved... differently. The developer offered way above market rates to the last holdout, who stil

I remember a holdout situation in my old home town that was resolved... differently. The developer offered way above market rates to the last holdout, who still refused. A few weeks later, while the holdout was out shopping, the developer had a "miscommunication" with a construction subcontractor, who drove a bulldozer through the building. Obviously, the homeowner sued the developer, but wound up only winning the normal market for the building. No longer having an emotional attachment to the empty lot, the owner then wound up selling the land to the developer as well, just to move on with life. Not counting some probably substantial legal fees, it actually came out cheaper for the developer than their earlier offer.

mikeash 12y ago
Sometimes the law seems incomprehensible. How is it that you can knock down somebody's house on purpose so you can essentially steal their land and all you have to do is pay for the house?
- aero142 12y ago
  As far as I can tell, we have culturally decided that all is fair if you are working for a company. Things that are clearly criminal if done on your own time are seen as just clever manipulation of contracts if you are working for a company. I can't understand it either, but it seems that simply prosecuting illegal acts evenly would fix most of the problems that people currently complain about as flaws in "capitalism".
- hnal943 12y ago
  The difficulty would be in proving malice. If all you can prove is a bulldozer accident, then paying them the replacement value of the house seems reasonable.
  - mikeash 12y ago
    And yet, I'm virtually certain that this would not apply to me personally. Let's say that my neighbor has a window that I don't like, so I go smash it with a hammer. When questioned, I say, oops, sorry, I meant to smash my window with a hammer! Just an honest mistake, officer! I was going to replace that window, but you know, got pointed the wrong way. I'm certain that I would still get hauled off to jail at this point. So, why the difference?
    - jdietrich 12y ago
      If (for whatever bizarre reason) your job is to go from place to place smashing a list of windows, then you might have a legitimate defence. No reasonable person could confuse their own house for that of a neighbour, but someone could reasonably enter the wrong house number into a database or misread a job sheet. This sort of stuff happens all the time. A backhoe driver misreads a site plan and digs straight through a utility trench. A civil engineer miscalculates bearing capacity, puts a piling in the wrong place and causes an adjacent building to collapse. A debt collector mistypes a license plate number and the wrong car gets repossessed. People make honest mistakes at work that cause damage and inconvenience; No just system can treat that as criminal behaviour without evidence of malice. It's a tort of negligence, no more and no less.
      - mikeash 12y ago
        OK, so let's expand the analogy a bit.... I don't smash your window with a hammer, but I hire a guy to do it for me. Afterwards, I claim it was a mixup, and that I meant to hire him to smash my window. After a long history of attempting to pay my neighbor to replace his window, and complaining about how much I dislike his window, and how I really really want it gone, would this not be sufficiently clear that this wasn't an accident? Is "revenge by contractor" really a viable, punishment-free approach available to me? Can I break people's stuff with no consequences beyond paying for the items if I hire a professional to do it for me? I don't think it would work.
        hnal943 12y ago
        It depends on how much money your neighbor would want to spend on legal fees proving your malicious intent. You are offering to replace the window, so there's not much more a civil court could demand of you.
        mikeash 12y ago
        Criminal proceedings don't generally require hiring private lawyers. It would be up to the local police and prosecutor to decide whether to investigate and bring charges. Which, again, I'm pretty sure they would. If they wouldn't, I want to know this, because it would be really handy to have this sort of tool at my disposal. (And important to know that others have it at their disposal to potentially use against me!).
toyg 12y ago
The homeowner likely got some money from the building insurance as well. So in a way, insurance paid for the property developer.
- icebraining 12y ago
  Can't the insurance sue the developer to recoup their costs? Seems like it should.
  - toyg 12y ago
    I guess so. Maybe the sum likely to be recovered was inferior to the cost of suing. I'm speculating anyway.

mikeash 12y ago

Sometimes the law seems incomprehensible. How is it that you can knock down somebody's house on purpose so you can essentially steal their land and all you have to do is pay for the house?

aero142 12y ago
As far as I can tell, we have culturally decided that all is fair if you are working for a company. Things that are clearly criminal if done on your own time are seen as just clever manipulation of contracts if you are working for a company. I can't understand it either, but it seems that simply prosecuting illegal acts evenly would fix most of the problems that people currently complain about as flaws in "capitalism".
hnal943 12y ago
The difficulty would be in proving malice. If all you can prove is a bulldozer accident, then paying them the replacement value of the house seems reasonable.
- mikeash 12y ago
  And yet, I'm virtually certain that this would not apply to me personally. Let's say that my neighbor has a window that I don't like, so I go smash it with a hammer. When questioned, I say, oops, sorry, I meant to smash my window with a hammer! Just an honest mistake, officer! I was going to replace that window, but you know, got pointed the wrong way. I'm certain that I would still get hauled off to jail at this point. So, why the difference?
  - jdietrich 12y ago
    If (for whatever bizarre reason) your job is to go from place to place smashing a list of windows, then you might have a legitimate defence. No reasonable person could confuse their own house for that of a neighbour, but someone could reasonably enter the wrong house number into a database or misread a job sheet. This sort of stuff happens all the time. A backhoe driver misreads a site plan and digs straight through a utility trench. A civil engineer miscalculates bearing capacity, puts a piling in the wrong place and causes an adjacent building to collapse. A debt collector mistypes a license plate number and the wrong car gets repossessed. People make honest mistakes at work that cause damage and inconvenience; No just system can treat that as criminal behaviour without evidence of malice. It's a tort of negligence, no more and no less.
    - mikeash 12y ago
      OK, so let's expand the analogy a bit.... I don't smash your window with a hammer, but I hire a guy to do it for me. Afterwards, I claim it was a mixup, and that I meant to hire him to smash my window. After a long history of attempting to pay my neighbor to replace his window, and complaining about how much I dislike his window, and how I really really want it gone, would this not be sufficiently clear that this wasn't an accident? Is "revenge by contractor" really a viable, punishment-free approach available to me? Can I break people's stuff with no consequences beyond paying for the items if I hire a professional to do it for me? I don't think it would work.
      - hnal943 12y ago
        It depends on how much money your neighbor would want to spend on legal fees proving your malicious intent. You are offering to replace the window, so there's not much more a civil court could demand of you.
        mikeash 12y ago
        Criminal proceedings don't generally require hiring private lawyers. It would be up to the local police and prosecutor to decide whether to investigate and bring charges. Which, again, I'm pretty sure they would. If they wouldn't, I want to know this, because it would be really handy to have this sort of tool at my disposal. (And important to know that others have it at their disposal to potentially use against me!).

toyg 12y ago

The homeowner likely got some money from the building insurance as well. So in a way, insurance paid for the property developer.

icebraining 12y ago
Can't the insurance sue the developer to recoup their costs? Seems like it should.
- toyg 12y ago
  I guess so. Maybe the sum likely to be recovered was inferior to the cost of suing. I'm speculating anyway.