I'm just going to vent for a minute so bare with me. Heck I can probably send the police to this post and have them use this as my statement. LOL! So this is about a piece of land that I've been trying to get.

Late 2009, I was looking for land, you know, getting my little piece of the rock. I have some basic criteria, must be on a hill, must have a view of the sea, even if it a crack of blue, I want to see the water. Anyway, I went and saw a piece on the west side of the island, that was a funny situation. Basically they said you see this piece right here with the great view of the sea and is just perfect, that's not for sale. It's the pieces that are practically vertical drops or they over look a brothell and are right under high tension lines. This would have been find if I wanted my future kids to develop some rare cancer and have excessive knowledge of all things sex. Uh... No Thank you!

Then there was the piece that had a great view, just breathtaking even if it only had a crack of blue. Oh yeah, that, no, no, no, the piece for sale is down there in the water way, so every time it rains take out your toy boats kids, we got ourselves a river. Thank you, but no thank you.

Just when I thought should I go to the shady real estate guy, who has a rep longer than the Nile and wider than the Amazon? Hmmm, why not. So I went and he sent me with his employee to see a piece of land relatively close to work and to the folks. Now imagine, parking at the bottom of a hill and climbing through bush like you're Indiana Jones or Quartermain, and when you reach the top there is this beautiful piece of land with a great view of the Atlantic and the hills to the south. Without hemming and hawing I announced that I wanted that piece. Now the guy said, he's not sure if that is the land I was to be shown or it's the other piece on the other side of a clearing. I told him I will take either, but my mind was set on the first one I saw.

I called El Shady and inform him that I wanted the piece. He tells me that first I need to give him $x to get the land surveyed and I have to make a deposit of $2x. I had the money available and gave it to him. My plan was to go to the bank and get a loan to purchase the land, to do this I need a letter from the individual selling the land. This letter will show all the info on the land including the parcel number and the block number. This letter was not easy to get.

I kept calling El Shady and he would say something like he's working on it. In the mean time, the accountant that works with my 7 to 5, started asking me about El Shady and the piece of land. She didn't trust El Shady, to the point where she said that she was looking at the same piece of land and that piece had been sold already. I kept my thoughts to myself and hoped that she was wrong. She wasn't wrong.

I got the letter two or so months later, the end of January 2010. As soon as I got it, I made an appointment with the bank and went to the Survey Office to see exactly where the piece I was getting was. So the piece I wanted and the accountant wanted was 470, the piece I was getting was 479.  479 was a wonky shaped piece of land, but not a bad piece all the same. Okay, I'll take it.

Now the land was being sold at $32x, and I went to the bank all ready to become another loaned sap. Yeah consumerism! Part of the procedure is to use one of the bank suggested evaluators to value the land. Now why did they cost me a grip and turn around and value the land at $26x. A difference of $6x, what should I do? Well, I could forget about the bank and pay El Shady little, little, or I can pay the the $6x, and go through the bank.

Extremely long story long, I went with option 2, I paid the $6x to El Shady and I was going to put together the funds for the 10 percent of the value of the land, as well as all the fees for purchasing land through the bank. Unfortunateley, or fortunately, emergencies kept popping up and I kept using the funds for them. Before I knew it, 2011 rolled around and news was El Shady got locked up for some... well shady dealings.

Now, I waited a while before doing my digging, figuring he wouldn't have done me wrong. In February, I started looking into my land issue. I tried calling him, hmm, cell phone is off. Okay. I called the office where I met him, they sent me to the office down stairs. The office downstairs told me to call a Lawyer, lets call him, The Eel, he kept slipping away.

I called The Eel's office, it just rang out. Then just by chance, I was talking to someone who was doing some work for me and he gave me his cell phone number. Yeah, I'm on the trail. So I call The Eel, I explained my situation, I paid down on a piece of land and I want to know if I can a) continue paying for the land or b) get my money back and deal with the land owner direct. Oh, don't worry, just come to my office and bring the receipts and we will ensure we clear up this matter. When will he be in office? Let's see, he has been in court every fricking day for the course of a month and he kept telling me next week. Then it reach the point where he was not answering the phone when he saw my number, I know this because when I used a different number he answered. Some bitch!! And you know what he said, "Oh, sure come in and I will start a file."

A file! Do you know what a file means to me? I'm going to put all your information in a folder, and store it away. Now that is what woke up the bitch in me. I got in contact with the lawyer dealing with my grandpappy's will and asked him what to do. He said to go to the police. Just to see how badly I had been wronged, I went to the company he was in charge of to see if the land was at least available.  Can you imagine it was sold before I even started to pay on the land!?!!

I went to the po po and made a report, I want my money back. Unfortunately, I've only found the receipts for the $6x. But if I find everything over the weekend, I'll build a damning case. Basically, I paid the following

"Surveying fees" to El Shady  - $x
Deposit & difference             - $6x
Evaluation fee for bank          - $0.3x
Grand Total                           $7.3x

All on a piece of land that was not even for sale. Heck I should even be reimbursed for loss of time, okay I know that won't fly but at least for the period of time between making the initial deposit and my receiving the letter to take to the bank.

I've learned a lot of lessons along the way, so I don't feel too bad, like when purchasing land deal with a credible agency or the person selling the land. Also, before paying anything check around for the price the actual service would cost. Right now, I'm focusing on getting my money back and I think it will be a while before I start looking for land again.

If you made it this far, thanks for appreciating my rant.