List Of Slumlord Properties For Keith Reitman, Mahmood Khan, Bashir Moghul, And (Oh Gee) Dana D Roman Numeral Three...

Photo by John Hoff

Above, crap piled up outside 2700 Morgan Ave. N., which was a property of Dana D III.

When my dad and I would go fishing, right before heading ashore we'd take our can of worms and just toss the worms--dirt and all--into the lake. My dad said if we didn't give the fishies some free worms, every now and then, they'd learn worms always have hooks and they'd stop biting on our bait.

And even if it wasn't so, my father pointed out, we could do the fish a favor and give them a meal, since THEY were so often a meal for US.

So it is I have come upon four cans of worms--property lists for four notorious North Minneapolis slumlord entities--but rather than play with the worms, rather than dish up the stuff piecemeal in numerous blog posts--I think I will just open the cans of worms and toss the information upon the wormy waters of the internet. Do with it what you will.

First, Keith Rietman. Oh, how happy I am to have a more current list of properties for Rietman. The last list wasn't very current, click here, and so I'm happy to have a better list. Here it is...

Property List, Keith Rietman, as follows:

Keith Reitman,620 Lowry Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-1441

Keith Reitman,2401 James Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-1934

Keith Reitman,2522 Penn Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-1704

Keith Reitman,1910 Penn Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-2404

Keith Reitman,1405 21st Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-2518

Keith Reitman,1600 Golden Valley Rd,Minneapolis,MN,55411

Keith Reitman,1405 W Broadway Ave,Minneapolis,MN,55411-2536 (a.k.a. the "ugly ass chocolate brown building")

Keith Reitman,1409 W Broadway Ave,Minneapolis,MN,55411-2536 (ditto)

Keith Reitman,1408 Golden Valley Rd,Minneapolis,MN,55411

Keith Reitman,1406 Golden Valley Rd,Minneapolis,MN,55411

Keith Reitman,2419 Penn Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-1701

Keith Reitman,2341 Penn Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-2432

Keith Reitman,2335 Penn Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-2432

Keith Reitman,2331 Penn Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-2432

Keith Reitman,2329 W Broadway Ave,Minneapolis,MN,55411-1732

Keith Reitman,1301 Holden St,Minneapolis,MN,55405

Here are the properties of Dana D III. Word is this entity is in trouble with the authorities, but properties continue to be listed as under the ownership of Dana D III or, as I always say, "Dana Dee Roman Numeral Three."

Danna D Investors III LLC,3609 Logan Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55412-1949

Danna D Investors III LLC,3953 Dupont Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55412-2036

Danna D Investors III Inc,3710 Girard Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55412-2023

Danna D Investors III LLC,2935 Queen Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-1058

Danna D Investors III LLC,3026 Thomas Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-1035

Danna D Investors III LLC,3126 Thomas Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-1037

Danna D Investors III LLC,2659 Queen Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-1722

Danna D Investors III LLC,2648 Russell Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-1725

Danna D Investors III LLC,3530 Logan Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55412-2334

Danna D Investors III LLC,3456 Penn Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55412-2324

Danna D Investors III LLC,3530 Morgan Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55412-2338

Danna D Investors III LLC,2700 Morgan Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-1131 (This is the notorious "salmon house" where so much prostitution took place)

Danna D Investors III LLC,2941 Fremont Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-1312

Danna D Investors III LLC,2818 Aldrich Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-1428

Danna D Investors III LLC,3251 N 6th St,Minneapolis,MN,55412-2621

Danna D Investors III LLC,1008 29th Ave NE,Minneapolis,MN,55418-2168

Danna D Investors III LLC,4653 Bryant Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55412-1428

Danna D Investors III LLC,2321 N 4th St,Minneapolis,MN,55411-2118

Danna D Investors III LLC,2031 James Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-1926

Danna D Investors III LLC,1418 Logan Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-3172

Danna D Investors III LLC,1723 Girard Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-3103

Danna D Investors III LLC,1112 18th Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-3211

Danna D Investors III LLC,1301 16th Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-3116

Danna D Investors III LLC,1514 Thomas Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-2914

Here are the properties of Mahmood Khan. Arguably, some of Khan's properties are the worst on the list.

Mahmood Khan,4011 Dupont Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55412-1612

Mahmood Khan,3414 Emerson Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55412-2521

Mahmood Khan,3238 Bryant Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55412-2536

Mahmood Khan,2722 Oliver Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-1108

Mahmood Khan,2639 Oliver Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-1846

Mahmood Khan, 2631 Newton Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-1844

Mahmood Khan,1604 27th Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-1212

Mahmood Khan, 2906 Emerson Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-1362

Mahmood Khan,2714 Emerson Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-1358

Mahmood Khan,2813 Aldrich Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-1427

Mahmood Khan,410 30th Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-1525

Mahmood Khan,315 Buchanan St NE,Minneapolis,MN,55413-1600

Mahmood Khan,818 44th Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55412-1403

Mahmood Khan,321 24th Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-2169

Mahmood Khan,2222 N 4th St,Minneapolis,MN,55411-2719 (This is the property where the body of Anshalike Hamilton was found. This murder is still unsolved)

Mahmood Khan,2135 N 4th St,Minneapolis,MN,55411-2716

Mahmood Khan,2414 Bryant Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-2115

Mahmood Khan,2223 Emerson Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-2513

Mahmood Khan,1621 22nd Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-1949

Mahmood Khan,2116 25th Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-1828

Mahmood Khan,2123 Oliver Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-1818

Mahmood Khan,2008 21st Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-2447

Mahmood Khan,1607 Hillside Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-1911 (This is the notorious "House of Poop.")

Mahmood Khan,1714 Oliver Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-3039

Mahmood Khan,1827 Oliver Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-3040

Mahmood Khan,2007 Russell Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-2416

Mahmood Khan,2126 Queen Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-2435

Mahmood Khan,1204 Knox Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-3811

Mahmood Khan,1001 Logan Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-3816

Mahmood Khan,1800 Lasalle Ave Unit 104,Minneapolis,MN,55403-3611

Last but not least, the humble slumlord empire of Bashir Moghul. Give Moghul credit for this: he has the most geographic diversity, not limiting himself to North Minneapolis but spreading his slummy ways all around.

Bashir Moghul,2942 Tyler St NE,Minneapolis,MN,55418

Bashir Moghul,4206 Colfax Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55412-1734

Bashir Moghul,3814 Fremont Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55412-2043

Bashir Moghul,2516 Lowry Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-1011

Bashir Moghul,3027 Penn Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-1121

Bashir Moghul,3114 Upton Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-1044

Bashir Moghul,3550 Girard Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55412-2418

Bashir Moghul,3347 Fremont Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55412-2404

Bashir Moghul,2646 Penn Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-1719

Bashir Moghul,2615 Newton Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411

Bashir Moghul,2950 Bryant Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-1439

Bashir Moghul,2617 Dupont Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-2039

Bashir Moghul,3318 N 6th St,Minneapolis,MN,55412-2624

Bashir Moghul,3248 6th St N,Minneapolis,MN,55412

Bashir Moghul,3200 N 2nd St,Minneapolis,MN,55412-2602

Bashir Moghul,2915 N 3rd St,Minneapolis,MN,55411-1509

Bashir Moghul,428 31st Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-1528

Bashir Moghul,318 27th Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-1518

Bashir Moghul,2317 53rd Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55430-3373

Bashir Moghul,5209 N 6th St,Minneapolis,MN,55430-3228

Bashir Moghul,4553 Camden Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55412

Bashir Moghul,2110 Lyndale Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-2735

Bashir Moghul,1900 5th St N,Minneapolis,MN,55418

Bashir Moghul,2514 Emerson Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-2010

Bashir Moghul,2415 Emerson Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-2051

Bashir Moghul,2118 Aldrich Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411

Bashir Moghul,2030 Willow Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-1813

Bashir Moghul,1900 W Broadway Ave,Minneapolis,MN,55411-2455

Bashir Moghul,1934 Oliver Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-2402

Bashir Moghul,1547 22nd Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-1947

Bashir Moghul,1831 Morgan Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-3017

Bashir Moghul,1500 Irving Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-3149

Bashir Moghul,704 Penn Ave N,Minneapolis,MN,55411-3626

Bashir Moghul,816 Park Ave,Minneapolis,MN,55404-1135

Bashir Moghul,1917 1st Ave S,Minneapolis,MN,55403

Bashir Moghul,2301 5th Ave S,Minneapolis,MN,55404-3635

Bashir Moghul,2532 Bloomington Ave,Minneapolis,MN,55404-3920


THESE LISTS ARE BELIEVED TO BE CURRENT but if anybody has contrary information, discussion, etc. there are comment threads available.

Danna D III Foreclosure Tour

Guest post and photos by the Hawthorne Hawkman

I've been getting rather obsessive-compulsive about getting photos and distributing information when someone passes along a list of properties. Hopefully that's a good thing for the rest of NoMi, but it's been keeping me very busy. Today's tour was of properties formerly owned by Danna D III, which were foreclosed on between January and June of 2009. I'd like to point out that I could be sure about how comprehensive this list is, and include other currently owned properties, if regular citizens could search public records with the property owner as a search criteria.

I know that most, if not all of these properties are no longer owned by Danna D III, and that in all likelihood these predatory investors are out of the game in Minneapolis. But I did wonder what has happened to these properties? What are they like now? Who owns them, and how quickly were they resold? Was there a primary lender behind this? (I do know a fair amount of Danna D III properties used money lent by Highland Bank, but did they perpetuate the problem or were they victims of fraud themselves?) To the extent these questions can be answered, what does that tell us about this type of foreclosure and its neighborhood impact?

What I found out was...

All but one of these properties (perhaps two) were purchased using money from Highland Bank. Perhaps Highland was complicit in Danna D III's activities or they're a victim of that fraud as well - probably something in between. But by and large, the properties were in far better condition than I'd anticipated.

I remember hearing buzz at the city earlier this year that Highland was entering into an agreement with the city about managing a large chunk of foreclosed homes. JNS readers are encouraged to fill in more details as they're known, but since most of the properties in question are in respectable shape, I'm going to say that this partnership has been more successful than not. Highland may have contributed to the Danna D III mess, but they're doing a fair job of helping to clean it up, and that's more than you can say about most lenders.

Clicking on the address will bring you to the city of Minneapolis website for each property. The next link brings you to the Hennepin County foreclosure website. When pertinent, I've also included photos of the houses.

1. 4653 Bryant Ave N had its redemption period expire 7/28/09 and is now owned by Highland Bank. The property appears to be occupied.

2. 3953 Dupont Ave N had its redemption period expire 7/28/09 and is now owned by Highland Bank. The property appears vacant although a close inspection of the door makes it clear that there have at least been attempts to break in.


3. 3955 Emerson Ave N is still owned by Danna D III, although the redemption period expires 12/28/09. Highland Bank will be the proud owners of this gem in short order. Since the sheriff's sale occurred in June and the property looks like it's been vacant for longer than that, one wonders why the lender did not accelerate the redemption period to five weeks? Damage to the door makes it look like squatters have at least attempted break-ins. This is also the first property to have a blue lockbox, but from the looks of many of the others, I'd guess Highland Bank bought these in bulk specifically to deal with Danna D III.

4. 3858 Sheridan Ave N is still owned by Danna D III, but Highland Bank will have this property by 11/30/09. I spoke with a neighbor who said that the place has been vacant for about a month, that the previous tenants were problem tenants who had loud parties and urinated along the side of the garage. Why am I not surprised to find that Danna D III didn't do such a hot job of screening tenants?

5. 3750 Queen Ave N will be owned by Highland Bank on 12/28/09. This property appears to have been vacant for quite some time as well.

6. 3456 Penn Ave N has been owned by Highland Bank since 7/22/09. This property appears to be occupied.

7. 3354 Penn Ave N has been demolished, and its redemption period expires 12/9/09. At that point, Western Bank (not Highland this time) becomes the owner.

8. 3530 Morgan Ave N has been owned by Highland Bank since 7/22/09. This one looks very nice and appears to be occupied.

9. 3530 Logan Ave N has been owned by Highland Bank since 7/29/09. It also appears to be occupied and fairly well-maintained.

10. 3609 Logan Ave N has been owned by Highland Bank since 8/5/09. This is one of those houses that's about the size of a loaf of bread, and set far back on a small lot. It's not clear if it is currently occupied.

11. 3126 Thomas Ave N has been owned by Highland Bank since 7/28/09. It looks vacant and probably needs some work before it's livable.

12. 3026 Thomas Ave N has been owned by Highland Bank since 7/23/09. This house also appears vacant.

13. 3710 Girard Ave N has been owned by Highland Bank since 7/22/09, and condemned for lack of utilities on 8/4/09. This house looks quite nice, and I'm guessing that Highland Bank added this little touch:


14. 3251 6th St N has been owned by Highland Bank since 7/23/09. This is an odd one that brings up a question similar to what happened in Hawthorne earlier this year. The top unit is currently occupied by a tenant who thankfully is "lawyered up." He spoke to me and said he knows he's in limbo but is letting his attorney handle that.


The bottom unit, though, is clearly in disrepair, as evidenced by the fact that the last time anyone stopped by to do work, they left both sacks of sheetrock and a case of beer. Care to take a guess as to which one they used, and which one they left behind, unopened?


And a bit of helpful advice to Highland Bank, from a neighborhood that's dealt with these issues: closing off a porch is always a bad idea.


15. 2818 Aldrich Ave N has been owned by Highland Bank since 7/29/09. It's hard to tell if this one is occupied. Kids on the street say people live there, but the "Jesus saves," door hanger clearly doesn't apply to the earthly condition of a property.

16. 2321 4th St N has been owned by Highland Bank since 7/21/09. It's been boarded as of 9/21/09, and a phone book sits moldering at the foot of the property. A boarded octagonal window in the back of the house indicates that this property may have at one point had some character. Slumlords like Danna D have probably sucked much of that life away, and it's unclear whether anyone is both willing and able to restore it.


17. 2941 Fremont Ave N has been owned by Highland Bank since 7/28/09. The structure information on the Minneapolis website lists this property as a duplex, but it's got to be a painfully small one at that. This one that I'd hope Highland Bank converts back to a single-family residence. Oh, and Highland? The garage is open to trespass. It doesn't appear that anyone is using it for illicit activities but winter's coming and it's only a matter of time if this is left unaddressed.

18. 2935 Queen Ave N has been owned by Highland Bank since 7/23/09. This one appears to have a rental license, but if it's occupied then I have to wonder what kind of TLC they're giving it.


19. 2659 Queen Ave N has been owned by Highland Bank since 7/21/2009. This one is vacant and has a notice posted that it is for sale by Keller Williams Realty, and a for sale sign out front gives a Highland Bank number to call.

20. 2648 Russell Ave N has been owned by Highland Bank since 7/21/09.

21. 2031 James Ave N has been owned by Highland Bank since 7/22/09. Like the previous two properties, this one also has a sign posted to contact Keller Williams Realty if interesting in purchasing the property, and that it is not for rent.

22. 1723 Girard Ave N has been owned by Highland Bank since 7/23/09. This house appears to be occupied. I'm going to just come right out and say this, and if I'm wrong, I'm wrong. I did NOT get a good feeling about this house. Sheets hanging in the window are, in my experience, very often a bad sign, and there was a group of people out front who were giving me very unfriendly looks as I was taking this photo. I've had this feeling and received those looks before, and it's never been associated with anything good. MAYBE I'm wrong here, but JNS readers, please comment if you know anything about this property.


23. 1112 18th Ave N lists To-Ha Nguyen as the owner on city records, but county foreclosure data indicates Danna D III lost it to Highland Bank on 7/29/09, and no sale has taken place since then. The property is vacant.

24. 1301 16th Ave N has been owned by Highland Bank since 7/22/09. This one's front door was wide open and someone was upstairs watching television. On a lesser scale than the Girard property, this combination did make me wonder about the tenants and the rental license.

25. 1418 Logan Ave N has been owned by Highland Bank since 7/28/09. No other owner of record is listed, and neither is a rental license apparent on the city website. However, lights on in the house and neighbors' accounts indicate the property is occupied.

26. 1514 Thomas Ave N has been owned by Highland Bank since 7/21/09. A "Clifford the Big Red Dog" toy sits forlornly in the front yard.


27. 2700 Morgan Ave N needs no introduction for JNS readers. Highland Bank has owned this property since 7/21/09. Hopefully it will be torn down soon.

28. 120 1st Ave N - I did not have time to get photos of this property and it is a condo or multi-unit structure, so public records are too numerous to verify which unit Dana D III owned.

29. 1008 29th Ave NE shows up on city records as owned by Highland Bank, but not on county foreclosure data. I also did not get photos of this property.

Take a look at that last number. That's TWENTY-NINE properties lost to foreclosure in SIX MONTHS. I'd love to sue the pants off of the Danna D crooks, but my guess is they've got nothing left to repay us for the damage they've done to our neighborhood.

Susan Newell and Ed Boler: Fraud Begets Fraud

Guest post and photos by the Hawthorne Hawkman.

In a recent post about mortgage fraud convictions, I was asked to do a miniature photo tour of the handful of NoMi properties impacted by the fraudulent transactions of Susan Newell and Ed Boler. There were only six properties, so tossing such a small amount of pictures up as a blog post didn't seem like enough work for this former farmboy. So I decided to dig a little deeper into the complaint document.

What I found has me utterly outraged, especially what happened at the property above, 1514 Thomas Avenue North. This is the property that was later owned by Danna D III before going into foreclosure and becoming boarded and vacant. From the looks of it, somebody is making repairs to the windows, since the boards are removed on one side and intact windows are now present. Let's hope this marks a better chapter than the mournful recent history here...

The borrower in this transaction asked Newell how it was possible that he could afford to buy a house when he was only making $5.15/hr at Perkins. But Newell had a plan for how to put this together: White would just keep on buying houses and putting the illicit proceeds from inflated values into a "reserve" until he could afford a home of his own. White was even told to stop asking questions at the closings because it made Newell and Boler look unprofessional.

To make matters worse, the seller was in foreclosure at the time White/Newell/Boler came along. AND Newell was a friend of the family in foreclosure. The sale price was $200,000 and $115,699.90 was disbursed to satisfy the outstanding amount owed from the sheriff's sale. That left a princely sum of $84,300.10 to be split up amongst the seller and any fees. In a normal transaction, the seller would have probably walked away with somewhere around $65-70,000; $50,000 at the LEAST. Not bad if you've just gone through foreclosure.

This, however, was NOT a normal transaction. Newell's real estate company earned a commission of $19,900, and Boler's mortgage firm pocketed $8,045 in fees. Both of those amounts are on the high end of what would have been earned on such a transaction at the time, but not illegal nor unheard of. Even that wasn't good enough. The roughly $54,000 still going to the seller was divided up by the title company in a very odd fashion: three checks for $8,000, $7,000, and $38,907.88. The last, and largest, check was purportedly endorsed by the seller and then deposited into an account belonging to Newell's company. (No responsible title company would allow such a transfer.) The seller claims to have never seen nor endorsed this check.

So to summarize, 1514 Thomas Ave N was in foreclosure in 2005, Newell took advantage of both an unsophisticated buyer and a vulnerable seller to initiate a closing at what was probably an inflated price. The seller was robbed of at least $38,900 in proceeds, the house was probably not maintained by the buyer, and then it wound up in the hands of Danna D III. It has been foreclosed upon yet again, and remains boarded and vacant.

This kind of chain reaction has been happening over and over in our neighborhoods and it's high time we put a stop to it. Getting the offenders into prison is a start, but we also need systemic, preventative measures.

For better or worse, I won't be discussing such measures in this post. Instead, we continue with the photo tour of other Newell/Boler properties.

There were a few rather boring properties, in that they were in decent shape and appeared occupied. First, 818 Queen Ave N:


Next, 2207 Aldrich Ave N:


And then 4527 Bryant Ave N:


2720-22 Penn Ave N was hard to spot since there were no houses on that lot. In fact, I couldn't even tell which lot it was. I had it narrowed down to the lot with the buried road construction sign or the lot with the floral memorial taped to a tree:



2918 Russell, however, was another vacant property with issues.





The garage has been broken open and haphazardly closed off. The notice of condemnation is so old that the sun has bleached it white and the writing in marker is no longer visible. And a sticker on the door informs us that the place was winterized in October. Of 2006. This house has likely been vacant since being a part of Newell/Boler transactions.

Now the way that Newell and Boler carried out their fraud was pretty typical for transactions at that time. They appeared to handle both the buyers' and sellers' sides of the transaction, inflate the purchase price, and then split the proceeds. The buyer would either use a "stated income" or "no doc" loan (often misrepresenting whether the property would be owner-occupied) or would falsify income on the mortgage application. For the record, falsifying information on "stated income" loans is still fraud; the income stated should be reflective of the borrower's actual pay. Inflated fees or fabrications on the closing documents allowed proceeds to be funneled to the entity of Boler's or Newell's choosing.

What I hadn't seen before in this complaint document was that BOTH Newell and Boler lied about their previous criminal convictions in order to get their licenses. Boler "was convicted and sentenced to prison in 1994 in Hennepin County for second degree controlled substance crime, and also convicted in 1997 in Minnesota federal district court of possession with intent to distribute cocaine."

Newell "has an extensive criminal history under her maiden name, Susan Elizabeth Brown, including felony convictions for theft by swindle in January 1999, wrongfully obtaining public assistance in 1996, theft by swindle in 1991, and financial transaction card fraud in 1991." I wouldn't trust this person with her own debit card, much less a REAL ESTATE BROKER'S LICENSE.

The fact that these events transpired at all is outrageous. Thank God that perpetrators such as Boler and Newell are in prison, but we've got a lot more crooked actors to chase down and a lot more messes to clean up.

Time To Put "Dana D Roman Numeral Three" On The Public Radar: This Is What Slumlording Looks Like...

Stock Photo By John Hoff

A person described as a "concerned NoMi resident" passed a bunch of stuff my way about a slumlord empire called "Dana D (Roman Numeral) Three" properties, and I'm more than happy to be a conduit for information. I can't take credit for this, except in my conduit-y way.

Here's is the slummy fun ride, as follows...


First, there was an MPR article on this situation several months ago. Here's the link to it:
http://minnesota.publicradio.org/display/web/2009/03/02/mplsforeclose/

They also had a map of Danna D III properties. Here's that map:
http://minnesota.publicradio.org/features/2009/03/02_property_losses/index.shtml

Armed with this information, (the concerned NoMi citizen) looked up property tax information at the Hennepin County website: http://www16.co.hennepin.mn.us/pins/addrsrch.jsp

And I looked up property information at the city of Minneapolis website:
http://apps.ci.minneapolis.mn.us/AddressApp/SearchByAddress.aspx?AppID=PIApp

I searched property-by-property from the info on the map. I don't know how Brandt Williams (of MPR) got his info. All properties are owned by Danna D III properties and list Julia A Rozhansky, 612-250-7400 as a contact person (when such a contact person is listed) Two other constants: every delinquent property tax bill listed in the MPR article of 3/2/09 was brought
current. And none of the TISH items that they actually complied with were done before the deadline.

4653 Bryant Ave N
As of the 3/2/09 article, owed $5,146.76 in back taxes
As of 5/20/09 had not paid 5/15 taxes of $1,639.13 plus a late fee of $65.57
provisional rental license through 8/31/09
TISH done 4/27/08, 16 items, 15 unresolved

3710 Girard Ave N
3/2/09 - owed $2,655.22 in back taxes
5/20/09 - $908.25 + $36.33
provisional rental through 8/31/09
TISH - 5/1/08 deadline
8 items, 7 unresolved
$1,301.50 in special assessments in 2009 (removal of rubbish, continued
fines for unpaid assessment)

3456 Penn Ave N
3/2/09 - $3,970.82 in back taxes
5/20/09 - $905.90 + $36.24
provisional rental through 8/31/09
TISH deadline 4/23/08
14 items, 0 resolved

3530 Logan Ave N
delinquent on '08 taxes $2,019.60
5/20 - $901.08 + $36.04
provisional rental license through 8/31/09, in review 1/30/09
TISH done on 11/27/07, no deadline listed (why???)
15 items, 0 resolved

3251 N 6th St
3/2/09 - $3,919.14
5/20 - $1,608.48 + $64.34
provisional rental license through 8/31/09, in review 2/20/09
TISH deadline 5/1/08
19 items, 0 resolved
$175 special assessment for rubbish removal

3126 Thomas Ave N
3/2/09 - $4,193.64
5/20/09 - $1,740.56 + $69.62
provisional rental license through 8/31/09
TISH deadline 5/1/08
43 items, 4 resolved

3026 Thomas Ave N
3/2/09 - $2,267.32
5/20/09 - $1,132.14 + $45.29
provisional 8/31/09
TISH deadline 5/1/08
16 items, 0 resolved

2935 Queen Ave N
3/2/09 - $2,508.66
5/20/09 - $1,027.43 + $41.10
provisional 8/31/09
TISH deadline 4/15/08
12 items, 1 resolved
$175 special assessment - rubbish removal

2648 Russell Ave N
3/2/09 - $2,879.78
5/20/09 - $1,003.19 + $40.13
provisional 8/31/09
TISH deadline 5/1/08
31 items, 1 resolved
'09 special assessment $134 cut grass

2700 Morgan Ave N
3/2/09 - $1,454.12
5/20/09 - $1,071.64 + $42.87
provisional 8/31/09
TISH deadline 5/1/08
7 items, 0 resolved

2818 Aldrich Ave N
3/2/09 - $2346.26
5/20/09 - $876.33 + $35.05
provisional 8/31/09
TISH - not signed by buyer, no deadline
2 items, 0 resolved

2321 4th St N
3/2/09 - $3,630.88
5/20/09 - $1,341.78 + $53.67
open/approved license 8/31/09
TISH - 5/1/08 deadline
24 items, 0 resolved

2031 James Ave N
3/2/09 - $2,671.92
5/20/09 - $1,587.69 + $63.51
3/13/09 license in review
TISH - 5/11/08 deadline
33 items, 7 resolved

1514 Thomas Ave N
3/2/09 - $2,250.34
5/20/09 - $891.96 + $35.68
3/4/09 VBR registration
TISH - 5/1/08 deadline
16 items, 0 resolved
$6,665 in '09 special assessments

1723 Girard Ave N
3/2/09 - $2,272.00
5/20/09 - $933.77 + $37.35
provisional 8/31/09
TISH - 3/31/08 deadline
15 items, 1 resolved
'09 $200 citation/special assessment

1301 16th Ave N
3/2/09 - $2,530.66
5/20/09 - $492.85 + $19.71
approved license 8/31/09
TISH - 5/2/05 deadline
7 items, 0 resolved

1418 Logan Ave N
5/20 - $724.42 + $28.98
undetermined amount in prior years taxes due (will find out tomorrow) no license
TISH 6/23/08 deadline
12 items, 3 resolved

1112 18th Ave N
5/20/09 - $456.38 + $18.26
undetermined amount in prior taxes
no TISH issued/available online
'09 special assessments - $350 rubbish removal, $758 boarding (likely a
$6,000 VBR fee coming up, but not showing online yet)

2659 Queen Ave N
5/20 - $1,812.14 + $72.49
undetermined amount in prior taxes
condemned, code compliance required in place of TISH
'09 special assessment $308 (likely another $6,000 VBR fee not showing yet)

2941 Fremont Ave N
5/20 - $1,782.61 + $71.30
undetermined amount in prior taxes
open rental 8/31/09
TISH 5/1/08 deadline
21 items, 6 resolved
'09 special assessment $134 vegetation removal

3530 Morgan Ave N
3/2/09 - $1,861.08
5/20 - $1,406.12 + $56.24
provisional 8/31/09
TISH - 5/1/08 deadline
12 items, 0 resolved

3953 Dupont Ave N
5/20/09 - $2,207.38 + $88.30
undetermined amount in prior taxes
provisional 8/31/09
no TISH online
'09 special assessment $325 rubbish removal

JNS Blog says: Wow, that's quite an impressive little empire. I have faith city officials are either all over it or soon will be.

My question is CAN THEY BE SUED?

Let's Put Some Limits on Provisional Rental Licenses

Guest commentary and stock photos (of a property that may or may not be owned by a slumlord) by the Hawthorne Hawkman.

I'd been kicking around an idea in my head for a while now about how to go about the problem of landlords who buy up large swaths of properties and then fail to take care of them or even avoid a cascade of foreclosures. I'm referring to Danna D III, Mahmoud Khan, Gregge Johnson, and Paul Koenig, among others.

At the Dessert with Don event this past week (where the Hillside Chronicle blog was generous enough to say that I was worthy of consideration for One Man Minneapolis), I tossed this idea out to a few people. This proposal centered around a pattern I saw when I researched and put live links to these slumlords' properties and noticed...

...a significant number of provisional rental licenses granted for many of these owners of multiple properties. Since city inspectors are too busy to do full inspections on every single rental property before it is rented/occupied, they often grant provisional licenses instead. JNS readers are encouraged to fill in more details, but the gist of it is that a provisional license involves a much less rigorous inspection, with the promise by the landlord that the property will be brought into full compliance within an agreed-upon time frame (usually a year).

In many instances, I'd see maybe ten or more provisional licenses all granted on the same day to the same landlord. Many months after the provisional license was in place, the properties that had them appeared to have little or no work done to be brought into compliance. Even if that did happen as agreed, it was clear that at least the bad apples were taking advantage of the system to avoid maintenance on their properties for as long as possible. Doing so almost certainly allowed them to spend money on even more acquisitions - with perhaps even more provisional licenses.

As you can see from this picture, I was deep in thought about this particular problem. Whoops! Wrong link. I was deep in thought...well, you're just going to have to take my word that I was thinking about serious things.

Like what to do about all these provisional rental licenses. Here's what we DON'T want: we don't want a system so cumbersome that landlords opt to just fly under the radar and rent without getting licenses; there's enough of that already. And we don't want a system that causes delays that are so long that very few people actually want to be landlords in Minneapolis. But yet by granting huge numbers of provisional licenses, it gives slumlords a tool they can and will use to buy even more properties without making repairs.

So what if we put a cap on how many outstanding provisional rental licenses a landlord could have? Let's just say ten at a time, although I'd like to see it close to five if possible. Once a landlord gets a total of ten provisionals, he or she has to bring ALL properties up to full compliance before any additional provisional rental licenses can be granted. Or at least the oldest provisional license must be brought into compliance before a new one is granted.

I believe that if such a policy were implemented correctly, we'd see two things: properties would be brought into full compliance faster, and at least some slumlords would acquire properties more slowly.

So what do JNS readers think? Does this idea bear looking into? Are there other ways we can approach dealing with slumlords?

JN-SPAN: Congressional Field Hearing on Foreclosures and Affordable Housing

Guest post and videos by the Hawthorne Hawkman.

Falling somewhere in between the venerated C-SPAN network and The Onion's "O-SPAN," Johnny Northside brings you extensive footage of Saturday's Congressional hearing in Minneapolis. We'll call it JN-SPAN.

Let's get the dry stuff out of the way first. This was a Committee on Financial Services meeting, an official hearing of the United States House of Representatives. Its title was "The Impact of the Foreclosure Crisis on Public and Affordable Housing in the Twin Cities," and this was the second time Rep. Keith Ellison has brought such a hearing to Minneapolis.

In the video above, NoMi's state Senator Linda Higgins is speaking about a condemned four-plex near her home...

...that was bought by a consortium of developers from North Dakota (state motto: "Flat but boring"). These developers bought approximately 50 properties in north Minneapolis, and in this property's case, failed the inspection for a certificate of occupancy. The developers lied about being certified asbestos removers, and got caught. But their work on the other houses is reportedly just as shoddy. (Hawkman asks: Can we get a name? Is this a new slumlord or one that we're already aware of?)

Rep. Jim Davnie spoke next.


Davnie has been another leader on predatory lending and foreclosure issues affecting Minneapolis and all of Minnesota. He and Senator Higgins have worked together to create or help pass legislation that curbed predatory lending activities, equity stripping, and abuses by landlords. Both houses of Minnesota's legislature also passed a Subprime Borrowers' Relief Act, which would have provided mediation for borrowers with subprime mortgages - if it hadn't been vetoed by Governor Pawlenty.

Up next was Hennepin County Commissioner Gail Dorfman.


Commissioner Dorfman has done great work around foreclosures and vacancies as well, but she references a "14% decline in home values" for north Minneapolis as a result of foreclosures, and that sounds incredibly low. I'd like to see what that number is once it's broken down by neighborhood, if that data is out there. In Hawthorne, I'd bet it's more like 140%. Continuing with numbers, Dorfman states that 55% of foreclosures in Minneapolis are from landlords, and that 10% of the people in homeless shelters in Minneapolis are from these properties.

ADDENDUM: An anonymous commenter on this blog pointed out that in my rebuttal of the inaccurately low percentage of home value decline at least in my area of NoMi, I let hyperbole get in the way of actual mathematics. A 140% decline would mean that the property has a negative value, which only happens in Detroit. Even in the most extreme cases of a fraudulent $300,000 appraised value of a Dream Home, and then a resale in the $30,000 range, the percentage decline would be 90%.

I didn't get video footage of Mr. Dan Bartholomay of the Minnesota Housing Finance Agency. His content contained very detailed mortgage technicalities, so naturally I was taking notes like a madman. Here's the Reader's Digest version of his speech: The Housing Finance Agency does loans geared towards low- and moderate-income households, and their loan portfolio performed significantly better than the market. However, funding has been difficult because subprime mortgages have given the whole secondary market a bad name. Either nobody trusted these mortgage bonds in general, or they didn't trust the information claiming the stability of such an investment. So now thanks to the subprime meltdown, finding access to funds that actually help poor people AND make money on their own is increasingly difficult.

The highlight of the first panel was CPED Director of Housing Policy and Develpment, Tom Streitz. If you watch no other clip from these videos, at the very least jump to the 1:40 mark of this one.


That's when Tom Streitz discusses one of the biggest victories in NoMi's response to the foreclosure crisis: The successful prosecution of the TJ Waconia fraudsters. When Streitz said that they were in federal prison, the room erupted in applause. Let's hope that the principals from Danna D III (who face federal charges) and maybe a few others will join them.

Streitz also gives some common-sense suggestions about how regulations around NSP dollars could be lifted to make our response to the foreclosure crisis even more effective. I have to agree with those comments, and will likely do a commentary about this at a later time.

Whew! That's about all the excitement I think we can handle for a while, but there was a second panel as well. That panel had some very poignant stories, including one from a tenant whose landlord went into foreclosure. Stay tuned to JN-SPAN.

Applying Some Horse Sense to Pamiko-gate

Guest post and photo by the Hawthorne Hawkman

Thanks to the tireless work of many JNS readers, quite a bit of information has come to light regarding Pamiko, the Koenigs, and their previous Dream Homes venture into NoMi-land. Quite a few posts and more than 150 comments later, I thought I'd try to boil things down a bit; apply some common sense, or horse sense, if you will. And since a lot of folks might be hesitant to wade through the legal documents posted here, I plan to focus on that.

But first, let's start with some numbers...

The Star Tribune reported a breakdown of where Dream Homes were located by neighborhood. They rounded percentages, so we might not get an even 100%:

Willard-Hay: 21%
Hawthorne: 21%
Near North: 20%
Jordan: 14%
Phillips: 7%
McKinley: 4%
Central: 2%
And the following neighborhoods with just 1%: Lind-Bohanon, Webber-Camden, Cleveland, Logan Park, Harrison, and Whittier.

Here's a breakdown of Pamiko properties by neighborhood based on lists on this blog. The same disclaimer about rounding numbers applies, as well as a reminder that some Dream Homes are still (temporarily, at least) owned by Pamiko.

Jordan: 28%
Hawthorne: 23%
Near North: 16%
Willard-Hay: 8%
McKinley: 7%
East Phillips: 3%
Folwell: 3%
And the following neighborhoods with one property (roughly 1.5%): Ventura Village, Whittier, Lind-Bohanon, Webber-Camden, Phillips West, Logan Park, and Central.

These numbers clearly indicate that the Koenigs have basically caused irreparable harm to the same four neighborhoods (Hawthorne, Jordan, Near North, and Willard-Hay) TWICE in the past decade. Also, I want to point out the Dream Homes fiasco came crashing down in 2005, right in the middle of the housing boom. Buying a house was so easy back then that pretty much all you had to do was stand on a street corner and say in a slightly raised voice, "I've been thinking about buying a home." Within moments, dozens of mortgage brokers would lunge at you from out of nowhere, thrusting their business cards into your hands. Even if you somehow didn't qualify for a mortgage, the volume of business cards alone would give you the raw materials to build a better structure than what the Koenigs were putting up at the time.

So how exactly does one fail at such a venture in a historically friendly financial climate? The legal documents provide a bit of insight into that question. But before Koenig failed for the first time at housing in north Minneapolis, he managed to fail at paying his bills entirely. It's ironic that one commenter said Koenig would complain about things like welfare fraud, where people are living off of government money without deserving it.

See, included in the list of creditors who didn't get their money is a list of about every level of government that collects funds from you and me. $6,173 owed to Hennepin County, $1,545 to the IRS, $24,835 to the state of Minnesota, $135 to the city of Eden Prairie, and $326 in bounced checks to the license bureau (If I had to guess I'd say it was for the license tabs so he could keep on driving his Lexus). That's $33,014 that the rest of us paid for with our tax dollars. Now maybe there was a legitimate reason for the bankruptcy and the discharge of those particular debts, but it still diminishes one's credibility when complaining about other people supposedly living off of the government.

The bankruptcy also shows $10,853 in association dues discharged, and my personal favorite bit, $19 to Blockbuster.

Some folks have speculated as to how Koenig got access to credit after the bankruptcy, but keep in mind when this was happening, credit was much looser. You could qualify for a conventional mortgage and most other lines of credit a mere two years after the discharge of a chapter 7 bankruptcy, provided you didn't have any new bad debt since then. (And some subprime mortgages were available the DAY AFTER a discharge of bankruptcy.) That gave him just enough time to turn around and inflict Dream Homes on our neighborhood.

Anyone unfamiliar with what a Dream Home is only needs to drive through north Minneapolis and keep your eyes peeled for a gigantic yellow box, usually with no basement, cheap vinyl siding, no garage, and virtually no distinguishing features whatsoever. That's a Dream Home, which was apparently called such by the Koenigs and Kohlenbergers without a sarcasm font. With no garage, no basement, and six bedrooms, these houses were constructed in such a way that they were and always will be dependent on a property manager. Where will the lawn mower and rakes, snowblower and shovels, and other tools be stored? There isn't a place for the basic accessories to owning and maintaining a home.

Most Dream Homes are currently non-homesteaded, and owned by landlords who have multiple properties. At least one, 2818 Aldrich Ave N, is owned by Highland Bank - meaning it was in all likelihood purchased by Danna D III and then lost to foreclosure. The plan was to build upwards of 350 such homes, and all I can say is thank God they went under before they got much past 80.

I've gone through the legal documents posted here, and I'm not sure if they're complete or if perhaps the cases haven't been fully settled yet. Heck, I'm not even clear about who was lying to who about what. But it is obvious that our neighborhood caught the fallout from their little war. Here's what appeared to have happened:

In August of 2006, Stephen Kranz, Donal (legal docs say "Donal," so if this is a misspelling of "Donald," this blog has not made the error) Parks, and Round Table Properties LLC sued Paul Koenig, Michelle Koenig, Pamiko Properties LLC, and MarkLee Construction LLC. "Dream Home entities" were also listed as relevant parties: DPK Properties LLC, Dream Home Development LLC, and KOKO Property Management LLC, as well as David and Sharon Kohlenberger.

A side note here: The Koenigs appear to have either a narcissist streak or are rather uncreative. DPK = David, Paul, Koenig/Kohlenberger. KOKO = Koenig/Kohlenberger. MarkLee Construction consists of the middle names of Paul and Michelle Koenig. Heck, even Paul, Michelle, Koenig = Pamiko. It's like a slimy version of Donald Trump. Ok...slimiER.

So the plaintiffs here essentially alleged that they were owed money from some Dream Homes they invested in, that they were lied to about the income streams that were being generated, and that the Koenigs and Kohlenbergers were attempting to transfer properties in a way that would prevent them from collecting money owed. A total of 71 properties with a $2 million dollar value was detailed. The plaintiffs alleged insider activities and said that six sales had already happened, resulting in $270,000 being made from those sales.

Also sued were Michael Czarnik, an agent of Dream Homes, and three Realtors, Jay Jasper, Tammi Panning-Jasper, and Amy Jasper-Fenske. Tammi is singled out as acting as a dual agent in the sale of six Dream Homes. Dual agency, or representing both the buyer and the seller, is fairly uncommon and can much more easily allow Realtors to engage in and get away with fraud.

Specifically, the plaintiffs alleged that Jay and Tammi provided a Dream Homes sales brochure that showed rental income of $2,247 per month per home. This dollar amount consisted of two separate portions: Section 8, and a "subsidy" from third-party charitable organizations established to supplement HUD rent payments - specifically to supplement Dream Home's "unique six bedroom houses." DHD (Dream Homes Development) claimed to have contact with over 30 such non-profit organizations, and had been receiving supplemental rent payments from them "for a long period of time."

Based on this information, the plaintiffs purchased six properties. But what was the ACTUAL non-profit subsidy amount?

The court documents allege: "On September 24, 2004, Kranz and Parks discovered that the 'subsidy or grant money' was not coming from third-party non-profits, but that DHD was paying this money out of its own pocket. Kranz and Parks subsequently discovered that defendants' representations concerning the amount of income each rental property generated on a monthly basis, and the multiple sources of that income were false. No non-profit or charitable organization had been supplementing rent payments with grant or subsidy money. That source of income simply did not exist." (Emphasis mine)

Also, Kohlenberger, DPK, and DHD owed plaintiffs money as a refund of $5,160.87 in overpaid closing costs. The defendants issued a check to repay that amount. Well, apparently the plaintiffs never called Mystic Lake Casino or the License Bureau to find out what happens when you try to cash a check from the defendants. And a jury might not be able to do so either, since the Koenigs had filed a motion to have the bankruptcy information excluded from the court proceedings.

The Kohlenbergers settled for $1,000,000, but it's not clear if they actually PAID Kranz, et al. The Koenigs, on the other hand went on to blame this whole thing on the Kohlenbergers. They sued the Kohlenbergers for $1.2 million over the transfer of four properties. Interestingly enough, they claimed that they were "personally liable" for the unsettled debts related to the properties. Wait a minute...I thought this was all done through LLC's...so why are the Koenigs "personally" liable? Could they be mixing personal and business enough to be held personally liable for the colossal scale of foreclosures and slumminess they've inflicted on our neighborhood?

In their suit, the Koenigs attest that the Kohlenbergers listed properties that didn't even exist. This accusation jumped out at me because I thought the Koenigs were doing the same thing with Pamiko properties this time around. Since my notes weren't clear, I went back to Hennepin County and double-checked. It turns out my notes are inaccurate, and there are no currently known fictional properties associated with the Pamiko issues listed on this blog.

The Koenigs also alleged that the Jaspers were listing several Dream Homes for sale without properly notifying them. The Dream Homes, according to the Koenigs, were selling for almost $300,000 at the time. Which leads me to wonder once again, what kind of people can't work together to make money when properties are selling for $300,000 in NoMi?

And that's the summary of the court documents posted on the JNS pdf site. It is not known by anyone on this blog whether this case has been settled. And even though the neighborhood has clearly paid the highest price here, we don't even know who will fix up these homes, how much that might cost, or who might be the next round of buyers. What we do know is that the Koenigs can't shovel enough sidewalks in NoMi to make up for the damage they've caused.

When Investors Buy Up the Neighborhood - A Policy Link Discussion

Post and photo of a Danna D III Hawthorne property by the Hawthorne Hawkman

Earlier this month, people from all across Minneapolis who work on housing issues got together at the McKnight Foundation to discuss the PolicyLink report "When Investors Buy Up the Neighborhood." On JNS, we covered one potential solution discussed, namely the need to be able to search city websites using the name of a property owner.

The report itself is about 45 pages and for wonks like myself it remains an engaging read. But today I want to focus on the small group discussions where we hashed out some ideas for how to help turn things around. One of the first issues that was raised was...

...the need to change the Non-homestead tax back to the rates used ten years ago or more. These changes made the difference in cost for homesteaded and non-homesteaded property taxes almost minimal. The intention was to drive down costs to landlords so that they could then offer cheaper rent to their tenants. One of the unintended side effects was to facilitate a financial model in which houses that would otherwise have remained owner-occupied were now run by landlords.

Many housing experts present felt that the lower-income renters were not seeing the trickle-down benefits of such a move, and communities like north Minneapolis or east Saint Paul were encountering landlords who were buying up dozens of properties with ease.

We recognized that having a simplistic "pass/fail" system for our landlords and investors results in scenarios where too many people get a D-. And we discussed ways to create incentives that would spur better landlord behavior. Some ideas included:

- a mandatory landlord training class (this by itself, I think, would not be very effective. Combine it with other efforts, and perhaps we could see some results.)

- Increase rental licensing fees significantly, but then create incentives that reduce them over time. For instance, double the fee, but make the second half of it due after a year. If the landlord completes training and has no code violations or other problems (or at least limited and minor issues) with the property, then the fee could be waived or reduced.

- set limits on how many LLC's one person can have as property owning entities within the city. One city employee mentioned a person who has over 80 individual LLC's for the properties he owns.

- While we're on the topic of needing better city databases and websites, we should also try and incorporate apps from iPhones, Droids, Blackberries, and other smart phones into how we track problem properties and share data. (I'm the wrong person to expand more on this, although I love the idea. I had my Blackberry for a year and a half before figuring out that the plus and minus buttons on the side were there to zoom the camera back and forth. My twin brother, on the other hand, has custom-installed several different operating systems on his cell phone simultaneously. Ask him.)

- In Collier County, Florida, housing violations are emailed out, resulting in quicker response times from property owners.

- Atlanta trains its residents to do certain kinds of inspections.

- Minneapolis has an Early Warning System to try and predict when properties will be in need of attention. That data should be expanded and at least the public data contained therein should be available and searchable to the general public.

- And of course, my personal favorite still remains good old Allentown, Pennsylvania, which publishes a landlord hall of shame on their own website.

Have at it, JNS readers. What policies would you like to see in place as a way to prevent slumlords and other unscrupulous investors from buying up the neighborhood?

Another Wrinkle in the Foreclosure Crisis?

Guest post and photo by the Hawthorne Hawkman

When you hear about something once, it's chance; twice could be a coincidence; but a third time and you start to wonder if there's a larger pattern. And now I'm starting to see a pattern with foreclosures in north Minneapolis. Landlords with properties in foreclosure are consistently renting out their properties to new tenants in between the sheriff's sale and the end of the redemption period. And surprise, surprise, the tenants aren't being made aware of the status of the house or apartment their renting.

Okay, so that's not REALLY new; that kind of behavior has been going on long enough that Minnesota has passed some tenant protections as a result. What IS new (to me), however...

...is that many of these landlords are receiving money from tenants using emergency assistance. Maybe I and others should have seen this coming a long time ago. After all, some residents of the apartment complex of anarchy told a similar story in the summer of 2008.

I was told then that the owner at the time, Shirley Guevara, went to homeless shelters and picked up people to come live in her two buildings, 3101 6th St N and 3115 4th St N. She did this post-sheriff's sale, but prior to fully losing her home to foreclosure. The people she got to live in her units were on public assistance and emergency funds were used to help pay their rent and deposit. Then, when they were evicted (and given plenty of warning), many no longer qualified for the very assistance that would have helped them in the first place.

And who wound up pocketing these public funds? That's right, the Mystic Lake Casino. But first, Shirley Guevara had the money for a little while.

Borrowing from Jonathan Swift, "I never wonder to see men wicked, but I often wonder to see them not ashamed." So it should come as no surprise that this slummy behavior has been repeating itself.

(a quick mortgage primer: once a mortgage goes delinquent enough, then the bank holds a sheriff's sale at the county. Prior to that sale, the mortgage can be reinstated, rewritten, or otherwise brought current. After the sheriff's sale, there is a period of time - usually six months - where the owner typically has two options, pay off the loan entirely or lose it to foreclosure. As Rosemary Williams and her supporters found out, there is virtually no chance of saving a home post-sheriff's sale.)

So a tenant using emergency assistance to rent from a landlord who is delinquent on a mortgage PRIOR TO the sheriff sale could be a win-win situation that gives someone a home and provides much-needed income to stave off a landlord foreclosure. But post-sheriff sale, that tenant will likely be evicted by a mortgage company and will never get their security deposit back.

I saw this happen to a family in the fall, and then yesterday I was at an NCRC meeting with an aide from Senator Klobuchar's office. During that meeting, E.B. Brown, who works at Oasis of Love in Hawthorne, mentioned that she was dealing with SEVERAL families in this very situation. One family had moved FOUR TIMES in the past year because of landlord foreclosures.

This is traumatic enough for a family to have to endure even once, but gets compounded when we find that public dollars are supporting foreclosed landlords. I've brought this up to various elected officials and public servants and I'm told we do have systems in place to try and prevent this very issue. That's more encouraging than if we weren't doing anything about it, but things are still slipping through the cracks.

This is your money and my money that is being spent to support landlords in foreclosure, and not in any way that meaningfully addresses the problem. How much money did Danna D III or Gregge Johnson skim off of their properties during the redemption period? How many other slumlords are out there doing this? How much public assistance money is being thrown at these no-accounts?

If you're reading this and you think or know your landlord may be in foreclosure, contact the Legal Aid Society of Minneapolis. I'm hoping to work with partnering agencies to understand the scope of the problem, and then with our public officials on an appropriate remedy. In the meantime, I want names. If your landlord is doing this, post information on this blog or contact John Hoff or myself (jskrenes@hawthorneneighborhoodcouncil.org). We need to put a stop to this, and call out landlords who are using our tax dollars to prey on the most vulnerable among us.

Bashir Moghul Photo Tour of Slumminess

Post and photos by the Hawthorne Hawkman

As promised, here is the Bashir Moghul photo tour (of Minneapolis properties only, unfortunately. I don't have the ability to get over to Indiana or track down vacant parcels in northern Wisconsin). One thing at least, is different than previous photo tours, such as of Gregge Johnson's, Paul Koenig (pronounced Kay-neg) of Pamiko, Mahmood Khan's, or Danna D III's properties: I have at times put a disclaimer at the start so as not to be overly critical.

That disclaimer said something like, "to be fair, we don't know if so-and-so made these slummy repairs or bought the property in that condition." Well I've had it with that nicety and I no longer care. If you, as a slumlord, bought a property and it was already in a slummy condition, then when you do nothing to abate the slumminess, it continues to harm my neighborhood. And we as a community will hold slumlords responsible.

The first photo above...

...is of 2942 Tyler St NE, a vacant lot owned by Moghul. He seems to buy quite a few vacant lots, and then almost forget he owns them. That is about the only explanation I can come up with for why he can't pay the minimal property taxes on the land.

(The post listing Moghul's Minneapolis properties was sorted by what neighborhood each property was in, and this post will show photos in the same order.)

2516 Lowry Avenue is the second photo, and was also the childhood home of one of NoMi's newest residents.

And here is 816 Park Ave...

Image from the Pixar Blog.

Image from wired.com.

...which is the site of the last residential structure in downtown Minneapolis. When I did the initial post, I had not determined whether the house was still there. But these images confirm that the house was carried away by roughly 100,000 helium balloons in a heartwarming story about an old man finally realizing the dreams of his youth and building a friendship with a young boy scout. No, wait! That's the Disney/Pixar movie "Up." What really happened was Bashir Moghul bought the property and let it fall into such a state of disrepair that it had to be demolished.


Up next is 3347 Fremont Ave N.


3550 Girard Ave N is the first really slummy-looking house we get to. Phone books and other debris are littered throughout the front yard. That's been reported to 311.




And what's this? Looks like another Neapolitan House!


Nice fence.


This is 318 27th Ave N.


623 26th Ave N looks okay, but has had problem tenants in the past...the kind of tenants that would assault their landlord, apparently. You can look at the other structures on this post and see crappy windows, but this is perhaps the first property where the such ugliness is glaringly obvious.





At 2110 Lyndale Ave N, take a look at the windows on the second floor (clicking on the photograph enlarges the image on a separate page). What do you do when the window you have doesn't fit the opening? Use plywood to fill the gaps. We'll see plenty more of this, unfortunately. Also, in the second photo, it sure looks like pre-existing windows were just covered up.



More or less across the street, we have 2131 Lyndale Ave N. Residents have reported seeing drug dealing coming and going from this property. While things have been getting better, the 2000-2200 blocks of Lyndale are a rough spot - right up there with Hawthorn (sic) Crossings as the last bastions of drug dealing in the Hawthorne neighborhood. Bashir isn't helping the community or himself by renting to these no-accounts.

And how many different ways can you count that Bashir has bastardized windows at this property?





2514 Emerson Avenue N continues Bashir's habit of slummifying windows with plywood.




2617 Dupont Ave N is one of the nicest-looking houses Bashir owns. Well, as long as you ignore the second-story windows, that is.


What in God's name is going on with 2915 3rd St N? I've got to think that extension on the second floor wasn't there originally. Anyone who knows more about the history of housing construction, correct me if I'm wrong. I'm NOT wrong, however, in pointing out that the windows once again look like crap.


We get a break from visually painful windows at 2950 Bryant Ave N, but only because this is a vacant lot.


2124 Bryant Ave N is next.


The windows at 1547 22nd Ave N are the housing equivalent of lipstick on a pig. You've got crappy windows and plywood that's not even painted, surrounded by shutters with horse-and-buggy decals.



Here's 2646 Penn Ave N.


And 3027 Penn Ave N, right next to a new community garden. It would sure be nice if Moghul would lose this property to tax forfeiture and then the garden could be even bigger.


3114 Upton Ave N is a tiny little house. I'm trying to figure out how the basketball hoop got all the way up in the tree.



3200 2nd St N is right next to the Lowry bridge. There are no house numbers visible on this property. That violation has been reported to 311 as well.



Here's another vacant lot at 3248 6th St N.


3318 6th St N is another property missing house numbers. Thank goodness for 311.


It's hard to believe that 2532 Bloomington Ave S actually qualifies as a duplex.


704-706 Penn Ave N has a lot going on. First, the doors don't match or even come close to looking like there's an architectural theme (other than slumminess). Second, carpeting has been left out in the front yard. That brings our 311 tally to four calls. Then there's just about every kind of window problem you want to imagine. Finally, what in the world is going on with the garage? This is a duplex, and the garage is clearly big enough for two cars, perhaps three. Yet there's only room for one car to enter and exit. Call me jaded, but I'd bet a steak and a Manhattan at Good Sports Bar and Grill that illegal activity is or has been taking place in a garage like this.







1500 Irving Ave N is right next door to a Dream Home (1504 Irving Ave N, currently owned by GF Properties. I just KNOW I've seen that name before. What I wouldn't give to be able to search city of Minneapolis and Hennepin County properties BY OWNER NAME to see if GF is up to anything). But 1500 Irving appears to have the lone window that has survived Bashir's renovations. Also, it's listed as a duplex, but I'd bet another steak dinner that it's functioning as a 3-4 unit property.






1900 5th St N was a tricky one to find. Throughout much of NoMi, 4th St just skips over to 6th St, making me think this might be some mythical, nonexistent intersection. But it's there, just behind Taco Bell and Wendy's. And the lot is--ahem--LITTERALLY covered with trash. That's 311 call number five. Anyone who wants to hold Bashir accountable here, just take a gander at this property whenever you're at Taco Bell or Wendy's and call in the debris that is sure to accumulate. It's got to be a real pain owning property in an area where so much litter piles up. On the other hand, it's primo real estate and I'm sure Moghul bought it in hopes that one of the few fast food franchises we DON'T have on Broadway would give him a hefty sum. If he's going to make money off of this land, then he should do the work of keeping it clean on a regular basis.


The city's website indicates that 2301 5th Ave S is a duplex, but as far as I can tell, there's nothing but vacant land where a duplex should be.


1917 1st Ave S is another vacant lot with back taxes.


3814 Fremont Ave N is our third vacant lot in a row.


4206 Colfax Ave N is one of Moghul's nicer properties as well.


So is 1831 Morgan Ave N.


Finally, at 1934 Oliver, we have our second Bashir property next to a Dream Home. This Dream Home, 1938 Oliver Ave N, is owned by Njeri Enterprises. At Bashir's property each door had a notice posted about unlawful occupancy, and poor attempts to remove them had been made. Either the place is still illegally occupied, or Moghul can't be bothered with the simple task of applying some elbow grease to make this place even a little bit nicer. How would you like to come home every day to a sign on your door about unlawful occupancy?




For old times' sake, here's a Pamiko rail.



Like the initial list of properties, this photo tour leaves me wanting more. I am certain that we have not fully documented properties owned by the Moghuls either in the metro area or elsewhere.

I am also VERY interested in knowing what criteria specifically is being used to bring the rental license at 2030 Willow Ave N up for revocation. If Moghul is behind on property taxes and loses ONE license because of that, well then the same conditions still exist in regards to every single other rental license he may have in the city of Minneapolis. Bashir Moghul should be forced to bring all of his taxes current or face revocation of all his Minneapolis rental licenses.

Finally, I have to wonder why Moghul and so many other slumlords seem to have the worst possible windows on their properties. Oh, I know that once they get around to replacing windows they'll just put the cheapest ones in. After all, their tenants will pay utilities, so why should it matter if the windows are energy-efficient?

But why even bother with the windows at all? Leaving an existing window alone is still less expensive than putting in a newer one. I'm told there are grant programs through either the city or federal government and even non-owner-occupants can qualify for assistance with their windows. Does anyone have details about that program specifically? It's bad enough when our tax dollars have to go towards cleaning up the aftermath of what the Koenigs and Khans and Moghuls leave us. But it would appear as if our taxes are first ENABLING such slumminess.

The problem is not just slumlords, it's a system that isn't stringent enough that allows them to exist in the first place.