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Simply - "Land use: must be used as a single family home"

Which everyone in their right mind knows it means you can't build a duplex or a gas station.

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Quote:

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Actually no one of right mind would interpret "single family home" as a duplex. Much less a gas station. You seem to be biased against the ruling due to personal involvement, I'll move on.

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You guys are on the same side of the interpretation. Not sure where the confusion would have come from.

That's right. I was confused as well.

It isn't and that is part of our appeal that was completely overlooked. The general term of "family" is never defined, until the judge made that ruling.

I'll PM you the actual court case and you can see how the judge overlooks all ambiguity and simply goes "nope a family consists of people that are related by blood marriage or adoption".

That would NEVER fly anywhere else but some podunk college town where local residents hate college students.

09 I got your PM but have not had time to look at the link but based on your quotes above it does seem that the judge went too far in his decision. Limited data but sure looks like it.

Good luck with the appeal.

Most of my clients have to look at the deed and HOA documents to prevent this but seems your situation evolved and now sucks.

That decision WAS the appeal. Two judges boofed this.

Yikes

I read through the brief. My thoughts exactly Steve I can't believe to judges ruled in the same Manor I would exhaust all Efird to keep reading it wrong it's a bunch of a horse **** that they are trying to define family at this level Court

Yeah so, if anyone has any good real estate lawyer contacts, I'd greatly appreciate it.

In the deed restrictions the words "single family" are used two times and both times they are adjectives describing a purpose or a dwelling (never talking about people). The first sentence " No lot shall be used for any purpose except single family residential purposes" is used in almost every deed restriction for a subdivision of single family dwellings. Some of these deed restrictions will include a separate paragraph which will define how many unrelated persons can live in a single family dwelling. Most will allow three but never zero. They just want the restrictions to be read as a single family dwelling can only be used as the dwelling of a single family. I wonder who gets to live in a multi family dwelling? A multi family? So a large brown dog house could only be occupied by a large brown dog according to this judge. This started 10 years ago when a lawyer that lived 2 houses down from me sent me a letter stating that I was using my single family dwelling improperly. At the time it was occupied by two of my sons and two other students. The lawyer died after he filed a lawsuit but before it was served on me. The original trial was on a Friday afternoon in May of 07and the judge had a graduation party to attend. The court room was filled with about 40 Emerald Forest residents (all over 50 maybe 60 and white) and Me (a resident of Collin county). This judge was elected by these people not me. I was screwed from the get go. Everything under the sun was discussed including the warranty deed (a document between me and the mortgage company). After about an hour and a half the judge said he was ready to rule. He found for the plaintiff and let the plaintiff write the court order. We appealed it to the 10th court and they rewrote the order as stated earlier in this forum. The local judge still is using the first order not the appealed one. I could and should write a book about this fiasco. My faith in the judicial system has been lowered to the point of zero.

Seems this could be solved by having the non related guy get a PO box, (and take his name of the address) and say he's just visiting for a while.

Done.

The neighbor walks by every day and takes pictures and used those as evidence.

AggieFanatic09 said:

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The neighbor walks by every day and takes pictures and used those as evidence.

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Evidence as what? That a person is 'temporarily' staying there? Is that not allowed?

Not if the "temporary" person is there for longer than the lease allows.

How would a neighbor know what the lease allows?

The lease is not the issue it's the deed and the neighbor knows what is in it and the courts ruling

They're both an issue.

Can't point to the resident being temporary if they're staying for more consecutive days than the lease allows

Neighbors wouldn't have to know how many days the lease allows at a certain point just to be a pest.

Not many leaves are allowing guests for 30+ days.

The fact that there is a lease would violate his law that people are livIng there. Trust me - my girlfriend who would stay over for a few nights a week got deposed because this neighbor said she was living there.

Had we lived 3 streets over nothing would have ever happened. We just got the crazy livIng 2 doors down.

John - I just read through the appeals of your case. Did I read correctly that you did adult adoption for the two extra roommates so that they were now legally family? If so, I applaud your resolve and going the extra mile. Well done.

johncockrell said:

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In the deed restrictions the words "single family" are used two times and both times they are adjectives describing a purpose or a dwelling (never talking about people). The first sentence " No lot shall be used for any purpose except single family residential purposes" is used in almost every deed restriction for a subdivision of single family dwellings. Some of these deed restrictions will include a separate paragraph which will define how many unrelated persons can live in a single family dwelling. Most will allow three but never zero. They just want the restrictions to be read as a single family dwelling can only be used as the dwelling of a single family. I wonder who gets to live in a multi family dwelling? A multi family? So a large brown dog house could only be occupied by a large brown dog according to this judge. This started 10 years ago when a lawyer that lived 2 houses down from me sent me a letter stating that I was using my single family dwelling improperly. At the time it was occupied by two of my sons and two other students. The lawyer died after he filed a lawsuit but before it was served on me. The original trial was on a Friday afternoon in May of 07and the judge had a graduation party to attend. The court room was filled with about 40 Emerald Forest residents (all over 50 maybe 60 and white) and Me (a resident of Collin county). This judge was elected by these people not me. I was screwed from the get go. Everything under the sun was discussed including the warranty deed (a document between me and the mortgage company). After about an hour and a half the judge said he was ready to rule. He found for the plaintiff and let the plaintiff write the court order. We appealed it to the 10th court and they rewrote the order as stated earlier in this forum. The local judge still is using the first order not the appealed one. I could and should write a book about this fiasco. My faith in the judicial system has been lowered to the point of zero.

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We lived down the street from y'all I believe. My friend owned the house we lived in and he got the same letter around 2007. He ended up selling the home but I'm glad y'all are still sticking it to the man.

If sticking it to the man is 0-2 in legal expenses and facing jail time.....I'm not sure "the man" thinks anyone is sticking it to them.....

John....did you use any local counsel? Just interested in what you found when you started looking around at the local RE attorneys. I've seen some mixed bags there in terms of how they work these types of matters.

Local attorneys were used. After the first go about we used a different one for the appeals case.

I'm confused. Are AggieFanatic09 and johncockrell the same person?

Yes.

Okay. Thanks. I was confused.