USC

The Carolinas are basketball states!

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(And states dealing with a “clarified” boundary)

Congratulations to the University of North Carolina on last night’s win in the Men’s College Basketball National Championship!  North Carolina has always been a basketball state, and our hats are off to you!  Our Gamecocks made it to the Final Four for the first time ever, so both states are proud of their men’s basketball teams!  And congratulations to our Gamecock women who won their National Championship on Sunday!  We love seeing that flag fly over our statehouse! Both Carolinas are apparently now basketball states!

We are also states with a newly defined boundary line between us. The long awaited and much debated legislation “clarifying the original location the boundary” became effective on January 1, 2017, and both states are dealing with the ramifications of the legislation.

Some parcels previously believed to be in South Carolina are now confirmed to be in North Carolina and vice versa. Both legislatures insist that the boundary has not changed, but that since markers have been lost or destroyed by the elements, it was necessary to have the boundary researched and resurveyed. (If they had taken the position that the boundary line was being moved, they would have had to involve Congress.)

South Carolina real estate lawyers have been advised to consult with their title insurance companies for guidance as they deal with affected properties. In North Carolina, however, the Real Property Section of the Bar and the Land Title Association have issued a lengthy memorandum, dated March 20, 2017, to provide guidance to North Carolina lawyers. I thought this memorandum might be useful to point out the various issues to South Carolina lawyers and link it here.

The best advice I can give all of us dealing with issues surrounding this change is to proceed slowly and with due diligence, consulting your title insurance company underwriters every step of the way!

SC Court of Appeals Upholds Developer’s Plan for Tailgate Condo Project

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The SPUR avoids kiddie condo status.

In a case decided in the midst of a wretched Carolina football season, the South Carolina Court of Appeals upheld a restriction against rentals to students in a condominium project that was clearly built to accommodate terrific tailgate parties.

williams brice condoLalla v. The SPUR at Williams Brice Owners Association, Inc.* involved a three bedroom condominium in the shadow of Williams Brice stadium purchased in 2007 for $470,000. Mr. and Mrs. Lalla purchased the condo intending to enjoy football games and to allow their daughter and two roommates to live there during college.  However, the great market decline beginning in 2008 spoiled their plans.

The Master Deed contained a prohibition against renting to any student enrolled in a two or four year college. But owners could allow their children or grandchildren to reside in or rent a unit along with rent-paying roommates.

When the market declined, the value of the condominium substantially decreased in value, and the Lallas unsuccessfully attempted to sell it. At the time of the appellate court hearing in 2014, the condo had been on the market for four years.

During the summer of 2010, the Lallas notified the owners’ association of their decision to rent to college students and began to do so. In June of 2010, the board of the association met and considered a comment card from a unit owner complaining that the association was allowing the project to turn into a dormitory.  Following this meeting, the board sent out a notice to each owner indicating the restrictions would be enforced and giving owners until May of 2011 to terminate any violating leases.

When the rules were not followed by Mr. and Mrs. Lalla, the association filed a declaratory judgment action seeking interpretation and enforcement of the master deed. The Lallas answered and counterclaimed, seeking a ruling that the restrictions were null and void because of changed circumstances. The association prevailed in the circuit court, and the Lallas appealed, asserting that the restrictions discriminated against a specific class of individuals (college students) and are unreasonable because the violation caused no damage to other property owners.

football tailgateThe discrimination argument failed because ”college students have not faced a long history of discrimination, are not an insular minority, and have not been classified according to an immutable trait acquired at birth.” In other words “college students” is not an inherently suspect class. The purpose of the restriction, to insure the comfort and safety of the residents and to protect the investment of the property owners by minimizing the risk of creating a dormitory-like atmosphere, was held to be rational.

The Court of Appeals also held that the economic change in circumstances failed to support the termination of the restriction because the declining market had no effect on the association’s need to minimize the risk that the project might develop a dormitory-like atmosphere.

South Carolina dirt lawyers like to see restrictive covenants enforced as written, so this case matches our world view.  And the Carolina fans among us dream of an outstanding replacement for Steve Spurrier so those terrific tailgate parties can resume!

At the Intersection of Football and Mortgage Fraud

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Five time NFL Pro-Bowler jailed

football fieldIt’s a sad day in South Carolina! Post-flood, many South Carolinians are reeling from the damage to their homes and businesses. Many are dealing with insurance companies and FEMA, and more continue to boil water and dodge blocked roads and bridges. And in the midst of our State’s recovery, legendary Coach Steve Spurrier is hanging up his visor after eleven years coaching our beloved Gamecocks. As I was thinking about the idea of loss today, I decided to write about a place where football and real estate (in this case real estate fraud!) intersect.

We need only look back as far as October 2, when retired NFL wide receiver Irving Fryar was sentenced to five years in prison by a state court in New Jersey on charges of conspiracy and theft by deception. Fryar’s mother, Allene McGhee, was given three-years’ probation on the same charges.

Irving Fryar was the first wide receiver to be the NFL’s number one draft pick in 1984 when the New England Patriots made him their top selection. In his remarkable 17-year career, he played for the Patriots, the Dolphins, the Eagles and the Redskins. He played in Super Bowl XX with the Patriots and scored the Patriots’ only touchdown in that game in their loss to the Bears. He made it to the Pro Bowl five times and retired in 2001.

He was, at times, a troubled player. In 1986, he missed a game after being injured in a domestic dispute with his pregnant wife. In 1988, he was arrested on weapons charges. There were also headlines involving drug use, depression and even attempted suicide. But he purportedly turned his life around. While still playing, he received a Ph.D. from the North Carolina College of Theology and became a minister. After retirement from the NFL, he founded New Jerusalem House of God in his home town, Mount Holly, New Jersey, and became its preacher. He was also a regular speaker at the NFL rookie symposium and a high school football coach. His message in all these capacities was “don’t do what I did”, and “it’s never too late for salvation”.

So where did this redemption story run off the rails? Prosecutors argued in a three-week jury trial that Fryar and his mother, along with a financial advisor who testified against them, used false employment and income information to close six home equity loans on Ms. McGhee’s home in Willingsboro, New Jersey in 2009 in a six-day period.  Loan applications stated that Ms. McGhee earned $6,000 per month as an events coordinator at her son’s church. Each lender agreed to make a loan on the belief that it would be in first lien position. Four of the loans were closed in a single day! Only a few payments were made, and the lenders had to either foreclose or write off their loans.

This mortgage fraud scheme will sound familiar to Columbia lawyers. Matthew Cox a/k/a Gary Sullivan moved to Columbia in the summer of 2004, buying two homes in northeast Columbia communities. He convinced the sellers in both transactions to enter into seller financing transactions. He forged mortgage satisfactions on the sellers’ mortgages and subsequently obtained multiple institutional mortgages on both properties within several days in February of 2005, amounting to more than $1 million. He then disappeared. This scam was widely reported in the real estate community in Columbia and in newspapers in three states. Matthew Cox was a former Tampa mortgage broker who was eventually convicted of mortgage fraud in Florida, South Carolina and Georgia and served time in federal prison.

I will never forget the phone call from a Columbia lawyer who said courthouse abstractors discovered this scheme on the day of the closings by conferring about the name of the borrower whose title they were all updating!

SpurrierNo dirt lawyer looks back with nostalgia at those days of loose lending practices that were a major factor in the global financial crisis. But Irving Fryar’s story is a reminder that the clean-up from those days is not over!

Now back to football. Steve Spurrier is an outstanding coach who has done a remarkable job in our state. I wish him good luck and God speed in retirement. Now, let’s find our next great coach!