Roper

I really hate to have to part with another one of my animals but I do. Roper is heading off to an area near Hibbing, MN.

I received this reply on www.dreamhorse.com from a girl who asked if I would be willing to trade her horse for mine. Not really but I wanted to know more about the situation. So we emailed each other for days. I found that the horse she has was to much for her. A horse that wanted to go, go, go. She is a first time horse owner and not all that experienced with saddle time. I talked to Barry and we went for the trade. Roper would be perfect for her. He is so laid back, older and more seasoned. A dead broke horse. I did let this girl know EVERYTHING about Roper. Not too many faults this old guy has. Just a little barn sour but a fixable barn sour issue.

Then I wanted to see this horse involved in the trade. So Sunday off I went to see it. A little an the small side only 14 hands if that. Not spirited but a little sassy. I met the owner who is 15 years old and her mother. Nice folks. She tacked up the horse and rode her in the arena and yes she needs Roper. I jumped on the horse and rode her around a bit. After I got off we talked and they asked me if I was still interested. I wasn't but I was thinking of that 15 year old who wanted to be a horse owner and she needed Roper to learn on. I told them we will make the trade. This sassy horse is registered and my thinking is that I would probably sell it. She was used in the past as a gaming horse and 4H. I still think she has it in her to do that but to control the go, go girl in her will take work. We will see.

So once again...Farewell Big Guy! You are so needed for someone and you will be missed by us. She already loves you dearly and she hasn't even met you yet. Come Saturday the 29th her dream will come true.

Our Move....continued

The Landlord saga continues. The more we had issues with Charles the more I started to get upset. I was looking under the Renter-Landlord Rights and Responsibilities under the State of Minnesota. I sent him the site to see for himself he needed to take care of his own properties. I said it was the law. Know what he told me! He doesn't do everything by law and working things out is his way with communication. He liked having 'cordial' relationships with his tenants. He felt he needed to know what you doing, where you were and to check in with him .. he says at least once a month. Or he would make calls to you and get upset because he couldn't talk to you or return his call. To me that is not the way a landlord should have a relationship with his tenants.

After the winter, as rough as it was, finally left our grips. Then the talk was on about putting a new place in. He kept telling us he was going to make trip to Minnesota and discuss options. He kept sending us different ideas and sites to check out to see what we liked. So about April something happened. First he kept whining about what one of his other tenants was doing to him and he kept telling us that he was going to evict her. To us...so what does that have to do with us and frankly it was none of our business. Anyway end of April came and he was asking for that increase back on the rent..he says it was a discount for heating. HA! We reminded him of the letter we have granting the reduction because of the dump we were living in not just for the heating costs. THEN he starting assuming that if he were to put something else in there we may not be able to afford the rent. The next thing he suggested we terminate our lease. MY GOD! What did we do to deserve this?? I asked him and you know what...he never answered. He just wondered if he were to put something in...can we afford it. We told him we could. Then he was wondering why we weren't giving him the increase and suggested an eviction. Again what the hell did we do? Finally we had enough and turned in a notice to vacate September 1st.

Before we moved there were a couple of things I wanted to do. I called the County of Cass and let them know that he had this black water spilling from the kitchen on to the lawn and had the water tested because the people who lived there before us...built a pit and dumped all kinds of metal, appliances and junk along with gallons and gallons of gear oil in and lit it on fire. The pit...about 200 yards from the shallow well that supplies the house with water. Then I wanted to know what he paid for property Taxes because usually tenants receive a Certificate of Rent Paid so they can claim a refund. He screwed us there. I called the State Revenue Office and told them he said he didn't have to fill one out. They said we would have to have a Rent Paid Affidavit from him. Okay but here is the good one. Charles Chernack claims he didn't fill out anything and when we received the Affidavit he had put down there that $880.00 was the renters share of property taxes and that amount was entered on a certain line of your tax forms. When I had it figured the first time we were looking at getting back a refund. After that sheet came the refund went out the window. I called the County to find out that his property taxes weren't even $200.00 for the year.

As we were packing we happened to notice that Charles put an ad in the paper.."HORSE RANCH for rent, yada yada. With a mobile home on it. $500.00 per month. We both just looked at each other and shook our heads. WHAT AN ASS! Then I decided to get on his website and see what he had to say about that. It said horse ranch for rent, has a mobile home on it but it wasn't fit to live in. He kept going and said that if you were interested in renting you would have to bring in your own house or shelter. The rent amount...$500.00 per month.

There were phone calls about the place and few visits and of course we told them EVERYTHING from what was wrong with the place to what an ass Charles Chernack was. He ended up renting to someone. The kicker is that they are paying $500.00 a month and Charles GAVE yes, I said GAVE them the house. We have decided that we are taking Charles to court and try to get our rent back. As far as we are concerned he owes us $7500.00 and that is not including the utilities. We even tried to see if he would settle without going to court...he wouldn't. So off to court it will go. The funny thing about this is Charles wants us to tell the court when the hearing should take place. He even said that if a summons comes that it should go to his property, the one we just moved from, to his tenant and then the tenant email him when it gets there. Oh and then he would give dates when he leaves the country and said he can't come to court around those dates. He wanted us to tell the courts to schedule around his schedule. What a laugh!

Anyone who reads this...Comments???

September Surprise!

Okay.... This is so not funny! Here it is September 14th and yes we are cold today. In fact the temperature gauge on the truck read 36 degrees at 5:30 AM. Barry and I left the cabin heading to Brainerd and when we stepped out and noticed it raining some. No big deal, Right?? Well, we get out of the woods and OH MY GOD! It was snowing. No Kidding!! SNOW!

As of last nights forecast we didn't hear anything about the chance of snow showers! Nice move weatherman! The local radio station up here said it was going to clear over night here in the lakes area. It didn't.

Once again the weather here in Minnesota is unpredictable. So why live here I ask? I'll never know the answer.

Our Move...

Finally back at the cabin where we felt more at home than at the place we rented west of Pine River. Sometimes I wish we never left here to move there. Have had nothing but disappointments from the Landlord. Speaking of the "Landlord". Never deal with this guy. When we first met him he told us he was sort of a Real Estate Investor. We first replied to an ad to rent a place and talked to him. Told us that it has been rented. But if we were to find someplace, he would buy it and we can rent it back from him. We took a Property Source book which lists all homes, etc for sale and looked through it. One ad we found was a 40 acre Farm with barn, stalls and 4 separate pastures fenced in. We thought.."GREAT". First we thought we would check it out and see if maybe we can purchase it ourselves. It was after all going for REAL cheap. Couldn't figure that one out either until...

We contacted the Realtor and went to see the place. Nice but it Had a mobile home on it. The owners were kind of strange for they ONLY showed us the area and the barn. Not the home or around it. Contacted the Realtor again to schedule a time to see it again but this time see the house. We met her out there and looked around. We were told that the reason the price was so cheap is because it was being sold a raw land. Meaning the house was not included. The owners spent their winters away from this state doing whatever like Rodeos and such. The more we thought about it the more we thought about the potential this place would have. The bad news for us is that we really weren't in a position to buy anything right now and called Charles Chernack. He was the one who we talked to. We told him about this place and that it did have a mobile home on it but we really have no idea what the condition it was in. He told us to check it out. Before we had that chance, he turned around and bought it anyway. You might say sight unseen. So July 1 of 2006 we moved in and THAT is when the real deal surfaced. Both the barn/garage and the home were in really bad shape. The people who were there.....PIGS! Left the place dirty, VERY dirty. The rent...$750.00 per month. This is where it gets good...

The house was nothing but mouse droppings everywhere. Couldn't tell you how many mice were caught. Everything was dirty from refrig, stove, bathroom, carpets, everything. ISH! There were so many holes in the walls it would have cost a bunch to patch and paint. They had 2 additions on the place that were rotten and open to the elements as well as no power hooked to either one. The sink and dishwashers black water was piped outside spilling out on the lawn. The houses main water source was hooked to a shallow well and the water line was on top of the ground. Windows were rotten. Toilet was loose because the floor was rotten underneath from a leaky toilet. There were cracks in the tub everywhere where they leaked and God know what the floor looked like under that. I could go on and on with a list that may be 4 pages long. We told this to Charles the Landlord and he said..."Let's put something else in". To us that sound good and very nice of him. It was a start. But then the true Charles came out. He said he was strapped for cash, people owed him money, then his parents died and there was money. The issue was that if he was going to do something he had better start soon because the weather was going to change and it would be too late to do anything. Well, he delayed it. Thank you very much Charles.....

We figured we could try and stick it out for the Winter and did what we could to the house. It didn't work. We had frozen pipes, and the plastic on the windows inside were breathing when the wind blew outside. We even put plastic on the windows outside. The furnace kicked in every 2-3 minutes which left us with a $414.00 electric bill for one month. All the rest were in the $300.00 range. We went through more propane than usual. We had the pump go out in the barn. There were cracks in the pump that had been there way before we ever moved in and when that went we told the Landlord. He felt that we should have paid for the replacement or repair. We laughed and told him that is was his responsibility.

TO BE CONTINUED.......