Bill Cunningham, the Great America. Welcome this Flarius Wednesday afternoon in the Tri
state Reds Baseball kicks off in about twenty seven hours Nationals in town. No
one's been hurt with the Reds today. But Mount McClain had what might be
season ending shoulder surgery yesterday to repair cartilage and a torn labraham and his shoulder
that normally is a two to four month process. Mount McClain, I think
going down the same route as Joe Burrow, can't stay on the field,
can't be healthy. We'll see what happens, and tomorrow it all kicks off
right here about nine o'clock in the morning, and I'll be at the Holy
Grail with other great Americans starting about one o'clock. Gets you ready for Reds
baseball. But until then, Chris Finnie as a great attorney in town.
He's involved in civil rights issues, human rights issues, also involved in property
rights, and he sues everybody he can, which we certainly encourage. And
Chris Finnie, welcome again to the Bill Cunningham Show. Two issues are percolating.
One is March thirty first is quickly approaching. And secondly, our squatter's
rights so let's deal first of all with them March thirty first, which is
a deadline, statutory deadline. Explain what that date means to the American people.
Yes, our office has been very busy preparing property tax valuation complaint challenges.
So the county auditors in Hamilton County, Butler County, and Claremont County
in January of this year came out with all new values for all properties all
in Hamilton County, three hundred and sixty thousand properties. And it probably would
be appropriate to mention the passing of our county auditor. I think they announced
yesterday who had served less than a year in office, and she had done
a great job for a very short time there. But I think she passed
from cancer, and I don't want that to go unmentioned in her service,
to be unrecognized. But anyway, every year, taxpayers have a right to
go into what's called the border revision. It's run through the auditor's office and
you file a complaint to have your value reduced if you think it's been excessively
valued. And a lot of people are doing that this year because of the
dynamic nature of the real estate marketplace both upwards. For some properties, so
single family homes and apartments, and downward for other properties, offices and in
some cases retail you know, malls and such. So there's a you know
a lot of people that are upset about their valuations, but the reality is
so. And by the way, Willie, the thirty first is typically the
deadline. That's a Sunday, that's this coming Sunday, So you have until
Monday to file with the Hamilton County, Butler County, and Claremont County auditors.
If you have listeners listening to Montgomery County the same and really every county
in Ohio has that deadline, but those are the counties with new valuations.
So next year, Warren County, everybody at Warren County will be up in
arms because they're going to get new values in January of of twenty five.
But thirty first of March each year is the deadline to file property valuation challenges.
So we are we filed on on fifty or seventy five this year or
something like that, And it's important. I've gone through that myself about fifteen
twenty years ago. You think it's a great, austere gathering of eagles,
and really it's rather informal, and you have to file it and then you
go to a hearing, which might be many many months from now, and
because of the large number, it might be a long time before the hearing
itself takes place. You need, if possible, to go in with an
appraisal, and you can put down on the form right now what you think
it's worth, and then later on in the weeks and months ahead, you
can get a real appraisal done and if it comes back right or wrong for
you, you can dismiss your appeal or you can go forward with it.
So, but you're saying it's now April first, by close of business April
first, which would be about four pm on Monday, Is that correct?
Yeah, and we recommend filing that in person. The form is available online
at the Hamilton County Auditor's site, which is Hamilton County Auditor dot org.
I believe, and let me just say a few things about the valuation process,
Willy. First of all, I get I must have gotten two hundred
calls this year from people who say my property value went up thirty eight percent,
forty two percent, sixty five percent, and therefore I must be overvalued
because property values didn't go up that that much. First of all, the
valuation increases a three year increase, so as johnt just one year. The
last time you got revalued was in twenty twenty one and then twenty twenty four.
Secondly, if the auditor had your value too low before, which is
many times the case, it honestly is, doesn't mean you're entitled to a
low value. Again, the target number that the auditor is shooting for for
every property three hundred and sixty thousand properties in Hamilton County is fair market value
as of January one, of twenty three. So what would it be worth
if you sold it? I had many calls from people Willie and they say,
well, this is my property worth what they say it's worth? And
I look online and I say, well, you just bought it last June
for that number. Well yeah I did, But you know, so they
think there's some fictional number other than fair market value is the assessment, and
it's not. And what the auditor values your neighbor's property for what he previously
valued your property for is simply inadmissible at the hearing and not relevant to that
analysis. The only thing that's relevant for a single family home as far as
I'm concerned, is either a sale of that home, so if you bought
it for less than what the audit says it's worth, you can pretty much
win automatically, or sales of comparable homes in your neighborhood and you see what
you know, homes on your four bedroom, two and a half bath homes
sold for in your neighborhood and that's what they're worth. Appraisers can do that.
I'd recommend going in with an appraisalt. I think when we have a
residential appraisal it costs maybe fifteen hundred dollars with testimony to do that. But
you don't have to have an attorney and you don't have to have an appraiser,
so you can pull up you know, if you you know, carefully
pull together that data, you can do that. Our office, by the
way, has a lot of resources online at Finnylawfirm dot com on our blog.
We also have a free one hour video if you email me at my
office. There's one on our website, but if you email me, I'll
send you the link Chris Chris at Finnylawfirm dot com and we can send you
the link to an updated twenty twenty four video. I did about six or
eight classes this year on this issue, and it you know, I think
the Border revision is having a record number of complaints. I will tell you
that I taught a class gosh a month and a half ago to somebody.
He filed his complaint in January and he got and he put a lot of
data in there of these comparable sales. He got a letter back in January
said, you get your reduction, you don't need to come down for a
hearing. And then, as you point out, when you do go to
the hearing, you know it's judge Judy. I mean, it's very friendly
as long as you have your ducks in a row. If you watch our
video, it'll tell you how to present your case, and you know,
part of it's being respectful and part of it's bringing the proper data with you.
And if you do that, you'll you know, a great number of
people get reductions. But having said that, a lot of home and by
the way, when you go down there, they can give you an increase
as well as a reduction. Oh, so be careful what you asked for,
because a lot of people are just not aware. Willy how much.
You know, if you've lived in your house for twenty years and you're not
in the market to buy a new house, you may not be aware of
how the housing market is out of control. But it's really sad for young
families today. If you didn't buy a house you know when interest rates were
down at four percent or three percent. Between the high prices and the high
interest rates, it's hard for young people to break into this market now.
It's really expensive. Well, Chris Finney, I want to send the American
people to Finny fi n n e y Finnylawfirm dot com. That's where it
starts and let's see what happens. I mean, the market right now is
crazy. Is still high prices and high interest rates many places, and that's
a difficult combination. Secondly, squatters. We spoke off the air yesterday about
this a little bit. Squatting has become a big issue. In fact,
online of TikTok and other social media sites. It tells individuals how to become
professional squatters and move from good property to the next. Squatter Rights in Ohio
I have a website up that Squad of Rights in Ohio gives certain opportunities to
a squad in order to gain title or possession of vacant property if they meet
certain requirements. Now, adverse possession means open, continuous, exclusive, adverse
notorious after twenty one years. So that's not the issue. The issue is
someone's gone for a period of time and someone monitoring the property comes in,
changes the locks and starts living in your home. And I had the Melissa
Powers on yesterday about this, and she's aware of two circumstances in Amblety County
in which the police were called. In one, the police were able to
course the person out under threats of B and E or burglary charges. But
the other one, the person who dummied up police, which was a bunch
of bs online, forged the name of the owner and then the tenant was
that person and it took months to get that person out. I want to
provide a public service to people. This is going to be a growing trend,
and you're the man when it comes to this, Chris Finny, what
about squador's rights in Ohio? Rob Sanders tells me similar things happening in Kenton
County. What are the rights of homeowners as someone's living in your house,
that's a great question. So, first of all, you know, if
you go back historically, you know it used to be self help, just
between the landlord and the tenant. Ohio, as with every other state,
enacted what's called a forcible Entry and detainer statute that says two things. If
a tenant starts out being rightfully in your property and then overstays, is welcome,
not paying his rent, or is causing damage to your premises, you
have to go through the statutory eviction procedure. You give them a three day
notice, you get a hearing date usually about fourteen sixteen days later, and
then they get another two weeks to vacate the property, and then you've got
to get the sheriff to set them out. It can take six or eight
weeks to get possession of your property back. They can even drag that out
by asking for a jury trial, but they have to post a bond in
order to do that. Okay, So the problem is if I have a
client who calls, are you subject to the Ohio Forcible Entry and Detainer statue?
Because if you don't comply with that, you could have a damage's claim
against you by the tenant. But when the tenant doesn't start out properly being
legally in your property. It doesn't start out a tenant or a guest of
your tenant. Then, as far as I'm concerned, you can use self
help. Now, self help can be lots of things, be going over
there with a bunch of buddies with shotguns and getting somebody out of there,
which is certainly within your rights. But you know, we don't nobody they
and you know it could end up being a very unpleasant situation. So we
don't want to what we call disturb the peace in this process. What I
recommend people do is wait till the tenant goes to the grocery store and literally
go with some plywood and some screws and a screw gun and nail the place
shut and they can't get back in, and what are they no, But
it's really in that circumstance, what are they going to do? Sue you?
Well, if they can, they're not going to win. I would
hope not. But then you don't have access to your property either. You
want to live in your house without plywood on the windows and doors. Well,
but once they're set out for a day or two, believe me,
they'll get there. They'll they'll you know, find it. Yeah, yeah,
and but but I'm just saying it becomes a question of of sort of
you know, posturing to see who can get without disturbing the peace, who
can get possession and control of that property. But I you know, I've
told clients in similar situations, just change the locks, you know, put
a put a board across the door, and they're either reluctant to do that,
or in the one case, I had a guy his mother in laways
living with him and he wanted her. He told her to leave, and
she wouldn't leave, and so they changed the locks. But then somebody gave
grandma the key, so it didn't it didn't work real well. But if
you just exercise your dominion and control over the property and kick the person out,
it's effective. Now if you go to Los Angeles, if you go
to New York and try that. The one woman in New York got arrested
for that. But I don't see the basis for any criminal charge against a
criminal or a civil complaint against a homeowner who does that. And if you
want to be safe and not get sued and not have a confrontation, then
you get the forceable entering detainer process, and in that process you actually get
the sheriff to go with you eventually to set the person out, and they
they you know, you have to set all the stuff on the curve.
The sheriff just watches over. It keeps the peace. But there's sometimes a
formal handover process with the sheriff goes in and says, you know, hit
the road and you get your workers to dump all their stuff out on the
street. It really is kind of almost a ceremony to see it happen,
and it's unfortunate that people find themselves in these situations. Don't get me wrong.
I mean there's people who live, you know, struggle a lot more
than you and I do to get through their days and weeks. But squatting
and somebody else's property is probably not the best way to get through all that.
I'll give you an example. An extended family member had a daughter who
moved back into her home. And this woman, who was sixty six years
old, she wanted daughter, had terrible drug problems, the wrong kind of
friends, out in, out in finally moves back, brings her all over
stuff in and show. Mom would come home from work every day and there'd
be two derelicts, three derelicts smoking dope in the basement, making a fool,
and these guys wouldn't leave, and so took it took several months,
had to go downtown. File it takes time, didn't show up, publication
finally shows up, legal aid, attorney shows up. It took several It
took two to four months to get the daughter out. And then as soon
as that happened, the police got involved and sheriff's office put the stuff on
the street. But then mom would go to work and the daughter would come
through a window and start the process all over again. And I'm thinking,
good, Lord, well, Chris Finnie, I like to provide some good
service to the American people. You're doing the Lord's work, and I think
we're blessed to have you in our community, not necessarily after the almighty dollars
so much, but just trying to help people. And I respect that quite
a bit. Well, Willie, over many decades you've been on the radio.
You are the personality, the pulse and the voice of common man in
Cincinnati, and we appreciate having you. But every time I'm on Willie,
I get calls from ten or twenty people say, Oh, I heard you
on the radio and so on. So you've got great reach and great respect
in the community, and it's an honor to be on Chris Finnie. You're
a great American. To get my best to your lovely wife. Thank you,
sir, I appreciate it. Well, let's continue with more and once
again that website Finny if I n n Ey law Firm dot com. If
you need more information, you don't necessarily need an attorney. I know it's
hate for lawyers to say such things, but you don't necessarily need an attorney.
But in my view, you need some sort of an appraiser or some
basis upon which to do this. Let's continue. Bill Cunningham News Radio seven
hundred WLW. Lawn Plus understands your time is valuable. There's not enough time
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