“Zombie House” Comes Back To Life

The house at 44 Diamond St. had a huge piece of plywood slapped over a gaping hole in the roof caused by a fire three years ago. And every day neighbors had to look at it.

They complained on SeeClickFix about the trash and fire debris in the yard and the overgrown grass and rodents that crept from the house into their yards. They complained to their alder and the city’s anti-blight agency, the Livable City Initiative (LCI). But nothing seemed to ever change, except conditions getting worse.

Then one day this spring neighbor Pamela Bess said she saw people out in the yard cleaning it up. She’s been living next door to the ​“zombie house” — an abandoned property on which an out-of-town lender refuses to complete a foreclosure and take title, leaving neighbors and the city to live with the continued blight — for about a year and a half.

“I said, ​‘This is so nice of you all,’” she recalled. ​“I almost had tears in my eyes.”

The crew that arrived was actually coming from the funeral of a man named Ken Siksay of the Stratford based Blue Wolf Contracting LLC. He had been contracted by National Field Network, which manages the property, to finally clean up the site that has been the bane of an otherwise well kept street in Beaver Hills.

Not too long after the clean up crew came to remove debris from the house, scaffolding started going up and work began on the fire damaged roof. Bess said months later that things were certainly looking up next door.

“I couldn’t even hang out in the backyard because there were so many [bugs and rodents] over there,” she said. ​“But since they started cleaning up over there, they’ve been gone. It really hasn’t been bad lately. I was so happy when the guy came, I was out here talking to him for about an hour.”

Her words were good news to LCI’s resident ​“zombie house” slayer, Evan Trachten.

LCI has been working on getting someone to do something about the house since it caught fire three years ago. The home is owned by the estate of the several years deceased Elizabeth Chatman. Trachten said LCI has attempted to get ahold of the estate’s executrix, Evelyn Stepney, who is based in Moreno Valley, Calif., with no luck. He said all correspondence LCI has sent to her came back unopened.

After some sleuthing he was able to determine that the property is historic. It predates the other homes in the neighborhood. It has been in foreclosure and in the hands of Reverse Mortgage Solutions. National Field Network is responsible for managing the property.

In May of last year, LCI cited the property for violating the city’s anti-blight and property maintenance, hitting it with six exterior violations. When it got no response, LCI slapped a $5,100 lien on the house. Until the clean-up this spring, the property also was accruing a $100 a day fine for each day it was not cleaned up.

“I’m sure any day now someone with the company is going to call and ask what the bottom line on this, and she may fall out of her chair when she sees the payoff,” he said.

Trachten estimated that between the lien and the fines, someone owes the city around $50,000 — whoever ends up with the title. A court-ordered sale is scheduled for Oct. 15. Finding a buyer might be tricky: The property has $156,900 of debt on it, according to the notice of judgement of foreclosure by sale issued on Aug. 1. Its fair market value is estimated at $40,000.

Not Perfect

Meanwhile, Trachten is glad the roof is repaired and the fire debris is gone. When he went to check on the house Friday, he saw the grass was cut around the house. But he said he’s not declaring success until the house on the market for sale.

“My most important thing is that the property continue the foreclosure process,” he said. ​“I believe the bank has ordered a sale of this property.”

He said he believes the sale is slated for October or November, but he’s learned that things take time.

“We can’t force them to do that,” he said. ​“This is not a victory for anyone. It’s just a process. It’s slow, and nobody likes slow processes. But the ultimate resolution will be when someone purchases it, and rehabilitates it. But we have no control over that, which again, for me, the guy out here is frustrating. I want to see a quick turnaround and this is one that has dragged on. I think the foreclosure started in 2013, or 2014, it’s taken forever, it’s a beautiful street, I wish we had a mechanism to make the process faster.”

“There is not a one size fits all solution,” he added. ​“As long as we can continue to have a dialogue with the servicing company and get them to do what needs to be done to care for the site while it’s in foreclosure, I think that’s got to be our standard.”

Bess said she’d considered purchasing the 44 Diamond St. house. But she realized the clean-up and rehabilitation would be costly. Instead she went for the house next door.

She learned Friday that LCI’s behind-the-scenes diligence allowed her to be able to finally enjoy her back yard.

“LCI does a nice job,” she said. ​“They’re on the ball … and I’m thankful.”

Trachten said LCI relies on technology like See Click Fixas well as good old word-of-mouth from management teams, alders and neighbors to find these nuisance properties cleaned up.

After a year and a half of dealing with vacancies, LCI once again has a specialist in every neighborhood tackling blight around the city, he said.

“I think what we are about to see is better,” Trachten said of the Diamond Street house. ​“I’m not going to sugarcoat it and say it’s a beauty, but from where we were to where we are, the picture looks better. And I think the real important part of this puzzle is that it’s a foreclosure process and we’re at the end stage of the process, given that they did a roof, given that we’re near the sale auction time, I think that there’s a reasonable expectation I can’t say anything is going to happen in the winter, but I’m very optimistic that some entity will be there rehabilitating this property in the spring.”

That will be if those currently responsible for maintaining the site can remember the basics like keeping vandals and squatters out. (A member of national Field Network’s violations department who has been dealing with the house could not be reached for comment before this story was published.) When Trachten arrived at the house Friday, the front door was wide open; the lockbox also was open, with the code for opening it visible and the keys inside.

So he got back on the phone.