Author Archives: Harry Styron

Sunday night blues

Posted on February 15, 2009 by Harry Styron

sunset-at-k-dock1

Sunday evenings have become much worse for me, as the economy has deteriorated, and I’m sure I’m not alone.

I used to spend a couple of hours making lists, getting ready for a week of new people and new projects.

Now I try to figure out how to get the things done that I should have finished last week, but couldn’t get to because of all the urgent requests and attempts to wrap up jobs that have been hanging for months, waiting on something, usually money-related.

On each Sunday night this winter, I’m facing a week of these kinds of calls:
• “I’m being evicted, and I have no place to go.”
• “I’ve worked as a sub for this general contractor for 10 years. The last draw on the last job wasn’t paid. How can I collect? The general is my friend and promises me more work.”
• “Can you make a power of attorney for my aunt to sign? She’s showing signs of Alzheimers, and she promised me that she would give me her home if I’d take care of her. If we wait any longer, it might be too late.”
• My house is being foreclosed on Thursday. How long can I stay there?”
• “The bank wants my truck and my tools. If they would take my truck, I could get by, if I can keep my tools.”
• “How soon can you get a deadbeat out my rent house? He hasn’t paid the rent for six months.”
• “Do you have any openings?”

Though I’m fortunate to be receiving these calls instead of making them, it’s hard to look forward to Monday.

My heart goes out to those who are going to make those calls. I wish I could help.

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Posted in Arkansas, Branson, condominiums, Ozarks economy, real estate development, real estate law. Bookmark the permalink.

HOA trustees can enforce covenants, even though they didn’t have annual meetings

Posted on February 11, 2009 by Harry Styron

If you want to stop a homeowners association from collecting assessments or enforcing restrictions, often the best tactic is to smear the HOA.

Here’s how the smear works. Read the rest of this entry →

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When I think of spring, I think of gardens

Posted on February 8, 2009 by Harry Styron

When I think of growing things, I think of Jim Long, whose writings I’ve enjoyed reading and learning from for many years. Jim is well-known all over the United States for his knowledge about growing things, and he writes and lectures all over the place. Jim is an expert on growing herbs, flowers and vegetables in the Ozarks. Unlike most of the rest of us, he paid attention to his elders about such things, and he studied and experimented on his own.

Jim and Josh Young live at Long Creek Herb Farm, near Long Creek and the Arkansas-Missouri line outside Oak Grove, Arkansas, south of Table Rock Lake and Branson. Their website contains a wealth of information about gardening in the Ozarks, and how to purchase Josh’s interesting and funny book “Missouri Curiosities,” and the various other products that they sell. Despite the tremendous knowledge that they have, Jim and Josh are anything but snobs about gardening, food or anything else.

Jim has asked me if I know people in the area (Taney and Stone counties of Missouri; Carroll and Boone counties of Arkansas) who are interested in the slow food movement, which is partly a reaction to fast-food, but more a recognition of the basic need to eat well. If you are interested, please contact Jim through his website.

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Maybe being married is okay, even with debts

Posted on February 5, 2009 by Harry Styron

Capital Bank asked the Taney County Sheriff to sell Rocky’s, a popular Italian restaurant in Branson, to satisfy a judgment awarded by an Arkansas court against the owner of the restaurant. Judge Orr stopped the sheriff’s sale, because the restaurant land and building were owned by Mr. and Mrs. Charles Barnes, while the Arkansas court’s judgment was against only Mr. Barnes. The Missouri Court of Appeals affirmed Judge Orr’s ruling in an opinion dated February 2, 2009.

I had a great lunch at Rocky’s on February 3, so I’m glad that a bank didn’t take over the restaurant.

In Missouri and several other states, a married couple can own property as though they were one person, in a form of ownership called “tenancy by the entirety.” In Missouri, a tenancy by the entirety is presumed to have been created when a deed to a married couple uses the words “husband and wife” after their names, if they are in fact married.  A deed is a written document, signed by the grantor(s), which is evidence of the intent of the grantor to convey property to the grantee(s).

The holding of the Barnes case does not break new ground, but it explains why careful lenders usually insist that a personal guaranty and deed of trust (mortgage) be signed by each spouse, otherwise the collateral may not be reachable. Generally, the tenancy by the entirety form of ownership will stop even the IRS from seizing the property of a married couple for taxes owed only by one spouse.

From the borrower’s point of view, holding real estate as tenants by the entirety can be a good idea. A limited liability company (LLC) or corporation is created as an operating entity for a small business,which leases real estate from the husband and wife. The husband and wife are protected from personal liability for business debts that they have not personally guaranteed. The lease income is not subject to self-employment tax.

An additional question is whether the LLC membership interests or corporate shares should be held by both husband and wife, as tenants by the entireties or whether each should own half or whether some other form of ownership is desirable. Answering this question requires careful analysis by a lawyer, estate planner and tax advisor working together.

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Calico Sunrise: watch what happens

Posted on February 4, 2009 by Harry Styron

Residents of the Calico Rock area, on the White River in north central Arkansas, are attempting to plan their future. They have created a blog called Calico Sunrise to serve as a newsletter and forum for their endeavor, which is intended to involve the input of all segments of the community.

The Calico Rock area is lovely, and it looks like a great place to live and to visit. It is similar to the Branson area in a purely physical sense–it is in the Ozarks on the White River with a railroad running alongside, there are lakes nearby, and there are wonderful bluffs and vistas and smaller streams in deep, quiet valleys. While there is some tourism there and a lot of retirees, the tourism lacks the industrial-strength tourism of Branson. In some ways, Calico Rock is what Branson might have been without Silver Dollar City and the music show industry.

I wish the people of Calico Rock well. I hope they will focus on health rather than growth, so that they can have the community they want and stay off the economic roller-coaster. To do this, they will need to look at giving their children great educations and building an economy with an export sector, rather than too heavily based on tourism.

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In praise of real estate developers

Posted on February 3, 2009 by Harry Styron

Much of my work in the past decade has involved representation of real estate developers, though they are fading fast. Though my firm has other sources of revenue–municipalities, lenders and homeowner associations–I really miss the developers, because I admire their courage and enjoy their personalities and optimistic approach to life. All of them are low, and some of them are sunk. Most of them will pop back up eventually: they’re buoyant.

It bothers me to hear people talk about how bad they are and how, in this downturn, they’re getting what they deserve.

Developers are easy targets. They send in bulldozers and push over trees. They cause erosion. They would rather apologize later than ask permission. In other words, they have the energy required to plan and execute capital intensive projects, requiring personal financial risks and coordination of dozens of others–lenders, contractors, subcontractors, architects, engineers, lawyers, escrow companies, mortgage underwriters, insurance agencies, etc.

The result is that we have houses, streets, places to shop, and places to work. Read the rest of this entry →

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Is tourism impoverishing?

Posted on January 30, 2009 by Harry Styron

Many community leaders are jealous of the sales tax revenue and economic activity generated by tourism. They wish that their own communities had some of what Branson and other tourist towns have (the municipal revenue, the perceived business opportunities, and options for shopping, dining, entertainment and outdoor activities), but not the other stuff (the seasonal economy, the high percentage of residents who move in and move out, the number of business failures, the constant need to expand schools, the high sales taxes, the traffic snarls, the disorder of constant construction projects, etc.). Read the rest of this entry →

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Wish list for the Ozarks economy

Posted on January 28, 2009 by Harry Styron

Congress is going to do something. The House has approved a stimulus package, full of all kinds of goodies–only a few months after “earmarks” was a dirty, dirty word. And the Senate will put a few more pork cutlets into the package.

IRONY ALERT: THIS BLOG POST IS NOT ENTIRELY SERIOUS! PARTS OF IT ARE! WATCH FOR HINTS.

But what do we need in the Ozarks?

Whatever we don’t get here will go somewhere else. No matter how ineffective cash infusions are when injected elsewhere, we’d like it to have it go to waste in the Ozarks, where we know how to spend wisely because we’re not liberals mostly.

We might as well make a list Read the rest of this entry →

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Defunct HOAs: what to do?

Posted on January 26, 2009 by Harry Styron

Outside of incorporated cities in the Ozarks, the homeowner association (HOA) is often the government for homes in subdivisions and condominiums. The clean water rules enforced by the Missouri Department of Natural Resources include HOAs as eligible “continuing authorities” to own and operate drinking water or sewer facilities, or both, in subdivisions not served by public utility companies regulated by the Public Service Commission or by governmental providers. In addition, the HOAs often have the responsibility of maintaining subdivision streets unless and until the county commission adopts an ordinance to maintain the streets.

HOAs are ordinarily established by the subdivision developer, in order to obtain permits for sewer or water facilities and to create an entity for road maintenance. An HOA’s power to collect assessments from lot owners (or unit owners, in the case of condominiums) is established by the recording of subdivision covenants (usually called CCRs or a declaration). The HOA is almost always set up as a non-profit corporation, with the developer and the developer’s associates making up the initial board of directors.

Even under the best of circumstances, the developer fails to file annual reports for the HOA with the Missouri Secretary of State, and the HOA, as a corporation, is administratively dissolved. When few lots are sold, that also happens. And there are worse omissions and consequences: Read the rest of this entry →

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Underlawyered: it’s also a problem, especially in real estate

Posted on January 23, 2009 by Harry Styron

The success of the book Overlawyered, and the popular website that followed, is based on the conventional wisdom that the quality of modern American life has been significantly lowered–and the costs of health care tremendously inflated–by the proliferation of junk lawsuits and regulations that don’t accomplish their goals and cost way too much. Finding stories to support these claims is really easy. But those tales should not keep an individual from getting good legal help when needed.

I’m astounded by the underlawyering that I encounter. It takes two forms: Read the rest of this entry →

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