This is the lot under discussion. Doesn’t look like much I know, but oh, the possibilities!
About a month ago, C was cussing and sweating his way through clearing off the lot in order to put it up for sale. My husband mentioned to him that we might be interested in buying it. He said the price would be $45,000 pesos ($5,000 pesos more than the year previously) but that he would allow us to make payments. Oh, how I wanted that lot!
Hold on a minute, though. A few months earlier, an older man came to our house and said that the lot was empeñado (had a lien). Don R said that a young woman gave him the two lots next door to us as a guarantee for a personal loan of $20,000. She offered some hoochie-coo as well, but he said he was too old for that sort of deal and just took the property documents. So what was going on here?
It so happens, that the day this lien was made, I had seen part of the negotiations. I had given my keys to my son and he had taken them with him when the whole crew went to Cerano for an impromptu visit. I arrived home from work and found myself locked out. While I sat and stewed, a jeep pulled up and around, then went over to the other street and parked. In the jeep were C’s girlfriend and an older man that I thought might have been her father. Turns out, it was Don R and this was the point she offered to sweeten the deal.
So Don R loaned C’s girlfriend $20,000 in order to open a pharmacy in Moroleón, or so she said, and in return, she gave him the property certificates to the two lots next to us. When Don R came to our door, it was because she had yet to make any repayment and he wanted to know information about the girlfriend in order to collect. He and my husband hit it off. My husband made mention, that if the property next door came up for sale, we would be interested in buying it. He promised to keep that in mind.
We heard nothing more about the loan, repayment or pharmacy plans until that day C was huffing and puffing his way through the brush and my husband asked about the property. Since C had never registered the lots in his name, and I should know since I have all the records of La Yacata in my backroom, my husband asked if he had proof that he was the owner before any money changed hands. C assured him that he did. He hurried home and brought back a certificate and a copy of an IFE (voter registration card).
He presented a certificate in the name of J.A., which I had to admit was a real certificate, one of the ones Chuchi printed out back in the day. However, since I knew that J.A had sold the lot to G and, in fact, had a certificate in G’s name that she never bothered to pick up, this J.A certificate was not valid. And I told him so. Then C angrily waved the copy of G’s IFE in my face.
I told him that I had a copy of that particular document too, in fact, I even had a copy of the transfer of ownership from J.A to G, which I dug out of the file and showed him. Having a copy of an IFE did not prove that C was the current owner of the lot. What I wanted to see from C, was some document that said G had transferred ownership to him. He said he had those papers in his house.
By this time I was pretty heated up, so my husband told me to leave the talking to the menfolk. I retired to the kitchen. My husband and C continued talking. My husband suggested that C contact G and have her pick up the certificate made in her name then sign over rights to the property to C. If he did that, then we would hand over some money. Of course, I knew that G, having already sold the lot, would not be interested in picking up and paying for an invalid certificate. I was also sure that there was some sort of documentation that spelled out the change in ownership and that C didn’t have it. At this point, C started whining that he needed $20,000 down and the rest we could make in payments. I hollered from the other room that since the certificate that he had in his possession was in the name of J.A I would rather give J.A the $20,000 than C. Negotiation ceased at that point.
What it seemed that C wanted to do was get someone to give him $20,000 pesos so the debt could be paid and the documents would be returned. However, besides not being the registered owner, he can not legally sell the lots until the lien is paid. So…
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Surviving Mexico 