Steve Andrews, Tampa Tribune
After a costly, four-month ordeal, Danuta Brown regained the house and property taken out from under her.
When she walked into the Dover house on Raven Manor Drive on Wednesday, she wiped tears from her eyes. They weren’t tears of happiness – the four-bedroom, three-bath house was filthy.
“I can’t believe people would leave a house like this,” Brown said. “This is such a mess, I can’t believe it.”
Brown eventually won back her property after a company called Chateau Lan took possession of her vacant house, citing Florida’s adverse possession law. That law allows a person to take possession of abandoned property if he lives on it and pays taxes on it for seven years.
Though she was ultimately successful, Brown’s long trip through the legal system was costly and time-consuming, and ended with her cleaning up a mess created by someone she had never intended to have live in her house.
It’s a fight that’s become increasingly common as several companies try to use adverse possession claims to put people in homes they don’t own.
Chateau Lan’s Chris McDonald Sr., of Plant City, says he’s taken possession of about 20 houses in this manner. Records at the property appraiser’s office show Chateau Lan has laid claim to a dozen properties through adverse possession.
In December, McDonald somehow gained access to Brown’s property, which was going through foreclosure and which she was trying to sell. He placed 41-year-old Yvette Swain and her family in the 6-year-old house without Brown’s knowledge or permission.
According to McDonald, Chateau Lan collects money to maintain the properties and pay property taxes.
“For the most part after neighbors see the quality of the clientele we put in the neighborhood, they say, ‘I’m so glad you are here.’”
In early December, Brown discovered Swain and her family living on her property and the locks had been changed. She called the sheriff’s office.
Brown hired real estate lawyer Mark Aubin.
