The Troubleshooter 7-7-25

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:05):
Ripped need advice, so you don't have.

Speaker 2 (00:12):
Come running.

Speaker 1 (00:13):
Just as fast as we can, Shooter's gonna help coming man.

Speaker 3 (00:19):
This is the Troubleshooter Show.

Speaker 4 (00:22):
Now, Tom Martino.

Speaker 3 (00:25):
Hey, good morning, Good morning. This is not Tom Martine.
This is John Fuller filling in for Tom and Mark
and the gang who are out on a well deserved
day off. And so in the studio with me today
are two esteemed guests. We have Deputy Dmitri in the
house who is standing by ready to assist you at

(00:49):
a at a moment's notice. And then we had Brad O'Brien,
who is, as you all know, an attorney here in
town that specializes mostly in real estate and business litigation
and stuff along those lines, right Bren.

Speaker 5 (01:02):
Yes, I do real estate transactions and help people buy
and sell personal properties, also commercial properties, and if there's
a dispute involving real estate, I do go to court.

Speaker 3 (01:11):
Cool. So we are here. This is the Troubleshooter Network.
We are here to help you solve problems, answer questions,
take complaints. You give us a call with anything you
have going on, whether it's getting scammed by a business,
whether it's a challenge that you're having that we can
help out. We are here for it. If it's not

(01:31):
something that we can handle in person. We have a
list of I don't even know how many experts, hundreds
of experts that we can we can tap into to
find a particularized set of knowledge that can help you out.
So the phone number here in the studio is is
three O three seven one three eight two five five.
You can also reach us at help at troubleshooter dot com.

(01:53):
Those are the two best ways to get a hold
of us, and we're here to so give us a call.
We're going to go right to the phones today. We
have a caller on the line, Chris Chris, John Fuller here.
How can I help?

Speaker 6 (02:11):
Hey, John, thanks for taking my call. Yeah, I'm I'm
disabled and i've I had Ramos Law represent me in
a large case years ago, and their attorney there handled
the case. I don't want to mention any names, did
a phenomenal job on my case. He did a really

(02:32):
good job. And then unfortunately I got in three more
major car accidents. I have to be careful what I
say because we're in the middle of litigation. So basically
I got t boned by one of the major DA
Transportation Services with their lights off. Okay, lost consciousness, had

(02:57):
brain damage, got a mild rope, broke my back, broke
my neck, and I had already had existing conditions with
my neck. I had a front neck fusion. So anyways,
I hired Ramos Law again and my old attorney handled
the case very well. I was doing a phenomenal job

(03:19):
in the middle of for some reason, and I got
in another accident, so they had to I had to
stop my UH was in the middle of my recognitive treatment.
So then I got out of the hospital started I
went to get my recognit treatment started again and had

(03:41):
major issues because that's important to my case that I
get the full treatment I need to recover. So long
story short, my attorney leaves Ramos Law. Okay, I never
get a letter, an ethical letter saying he's leaving. What
I like to retain that lawyer? Would I like to

(04:02):
go with his new firm or or stay with him?
And I believe ethically they're supposed to send that letter
to me. Unfortunately I didn't get one, so I kept
complaining about not having my recardity treatment. They said they
got the finance and all set there shouldn't be an issue.
I kept trying to schedule with their people. They couldn't,

(04:25):
They wouldn't schedule. Oh, actually did schedule me, and then
when my appointment came, they said that I wasn't approved.
So major issues there because they were basically these are
their people. I saw their doctors. So that attorney left.
They give me a new attorney who says he's a

(04:46):
new attorney from New York entering my case. He's starting fresh.
I'm frustrated why new attorney were going on a year
and a half, I still got another year of treatments.
So still having issues with them, So I talked to
another attorney. They tell me Ramos Law, do's go to trial?

(05:08):
That's what do you mean?

Speaker 7 (05:09):
They don't go to trial?

Speaker 6 (05:10):
Well, they only settle cases. So I asked Ramos Law,
what's you know? Are we going to trial? Yeah, we're
going to trial. That's what's my attorney that told me
before he had left. And then a new attorney c yeah,
we're going to trial. We're going to trial. So I
can't get any basic questions from Ramo's Law. Why didn't

(05:30):
why I didn't get an ethics letter r Why why
they stopped my recognant condition why they are retaining maybe
ten percent of the file that they're holding lean against,
which is illegal. I don't how can you hold a
lean when they don't give me the information to for
us to go to trial. So I'm frustrated, and Brian

(05:52):
Cassandra over there thinks I'm threatening his firm when I
want basic simple questions to my case.

Speaker 3 (06:00):
Okay, So how can I help you today? And I
don't mean that to be a smart alec genuinely, what
can I do for you?

Speaker 6 (06:10):
Well, when a lawyer leaves the law firm, doesn't that
lawyer have an opportunity to take his existing clients with him,
or don't those clients have an opportunity to retain that
lawyer who's working on this case.

Speaker 3 (06:27):
Yeah, So you know, generally speaking, the client owns his
own case. Okay, So it's it's up to the client
where they go. You know, the things that we don't know,
Perhaps that lawyer was moving into a different type of practice.
Perhaps the firm that the lawyer was going to was
not set up to handle the matter in litigation, or
to handle the cost or anything else. We just don't

(06:49):
know the answer to those questions. So that lawyer may
not have asserted any desire to take your case with
that lawyer.

Speaker 6 (06:56):
Oh, I've talked to a lawyer. He started a new
law firm and in Colorado, and he wants to know
why Ramo's Law didn't sentimenty letters to retain his clients.

Speaker 3 (07:06):
Why don't you hire that lawyer?

Speaker 6 (07:08):
Because Ramo's Law has a lean.

Speaker 3 (07:12):
He's entitled to a lien. So just for the just
for the first Okay, hold on, hold on, hold on,
hold on. So let me let me explain for the
listeners what a lien is and how a lien comes
to comes to exist.

Speaker 6 (07:24):
So many liens I understand.

Speaker 8 (07:26):
Let me.

Speaker 3 (07:28):
All right, here's the deal. When you work on a
contingency basis. The essence of the contingency is that the
lawyer agrees to provide the work up front with an
expectation that they get paid at the end and and
and after all the work has been done, and it's
as a percentage of the amount that's been recovered. And
so in many cases, the you know it's not win

(07:52):
or take all, they don't go to trial with a
zero offer. In most cases, there is a series of negotiations.
There may be a mediation, there may be a whole
lot of back and forth. And so the fee agreements
that are that are set out by the Colorado Supreme Court,
which is who regulates attorneys, generally has a provision that
says the fee is earned as the you know, as

(08:13):
the money comes in. So in other words, and that's
that's meant to protect the lawyers, of course, but the
gist of it is that if you've got to say,
one hundred thousand dollars offer, you couldn't say that's great,
you're fired and not have to pay the attorney. And
so it makes total sense. And so that lean is
in essence saying, hey, there's been an offer. There's been

(08:36):
so much money that's generated so far, even though it
hasn't been you know, agreeable or you know, received by
the law firm and dispersed to the clients. But they've
at least, according to the contract, earned their fees up
until that point. They've likely also expended quite a lot
of money on costs for things like filing fees and
discovery and those kind of things. And so there's nothing

(08:59):
in proper about a law firm asserting a lean. In fact,
that's exactly what I would expect a law firm to
do if they're well invested in a case and they're
they're quite a bit down the road. But with that
being said, you always have the right to go to
another firm, but they're gonna have to honor that lean
and so it effectively operates as the only thing that
that lawyer could do would be to effectively a contract

(09:22):
with you for everything over the amount that has already
leaned on the case. Hey, Chris, we got to take
a quick break. I'll be right back and I'll finish
explaining this and try to try to help you out
and figure something out. Hang on a see.

Speaker 9 (09:38):
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Time for an insurance check up free, no obligation. In comparison,
call Compass Insurance paying too much your coverage at dozens
of insurance companies find out now three all three seven
to seven to one help. You'll think you're his own

(10:00):
week customer when you choose Frank durand the real estate
Man dot com to list your home with Remax Alliance
three all three nine two zero sixteen twenty two.

Speaker 3 (10:16):
Right, good afternoon, We're back John Fuller here filling in
for Tom and Mark. Today. It is Monday, July seventh,
after a big holiday weekend. Hope everybody had a fun
and safe time out there. We're going to talk about
some of the people that didn't have fun, safe weekends
and stuff. And it seems like after every fourth of
July we have, you know, reports of house fires and

(10:40):
burns and blown off fingers and all that stuff. We're
going to talk about that a little bit later on.
We've got a couple of callers on the line. We
want to finish up with Chris here. Chris called and
Chris has had way more accidents than any one person
should have. He had a bad one, had a great
experience with a local law firm, and then went on

(11:01):
to have a couple more accidents and is having less
than a great experience with a local law firm. And
we went to the break with me explaining that there
are circumstances where the law firm can assert a lien
on a file, and all a lean is is something
that they file with the either with the insurance company
or the Secretary of State, or sometimes even both that says, hey,

(11:25):
notice to the world. We have earned fees and we
have expended cost on this file that we have a
statutory right to get paid for at the end of
the case. When that end happened. Now, you know, of course,
in a contingency relationship, if there is no fee earned,

(11:45):
if they were to lose in court or something, then
of course that lean would go away. But in the
event that another law firm were to take over that
file or you know, or otherwise slide into the lead
position on it, they're going to have to honor that
and pay that lean off down the road. So so
Chris is upset about the fact that there's a lean

(12:07):
out there, and he perceives that lean to be hindering
his ability to take the file to another law firm
or even take it to the to the attorney of
record that was on the file at the beginning of
the case. And I was explaining that there's really nothing
unusual about the lean, and and it is challenging. And
the reason why attorneys don't want to take on a

(12:29):
case that has a lien on it is because they
don't have the ability to earn a fee until they've
exceeded a certain threshold of money. So they could easily
take over the case, put a year's worth of work
into it, and at the end of the day not
achieve any more money on the case and simply not
get paid because of the existence of the lean that's

(12:51):
out there. And so it is what it is. I'm
not saying it's a great system, but it's the system
that we have. So so, Chris, back to you. I
want to know how we can help. What are you
looking for today? Are you looking for ideas or no?

Speaker 6 (13:06):
I just want you to explain to the consumer, the
client who is basically the victim of these accidents, what
their legal recourse is. When you have an attorney who's
retaining part of the case file, who has a lean
on it, done the work, but they won't give you
the work, and then my attorney continues to try to

(13:27):
get that and then they delay, they delay. It took
me three months just to get my last payment.

Speaker 3 (13:34):
Okay, did you hire another attorney, Chris?

Speaker 6 (13:38):
I did hire another attorney. And the issue is is
we can't go to trial until Ramo's law gives us
the rest of the case file, which they refuse to do.

Speaker 3 (13:49):
Well, listen, I can't give you advice since you have
a current attorney. But I have no doubt that your
current attorney has a number of different options. You know
that involve either the judge on the case stepping in
to order that the other firm comply with certain requests
or demands, and and then if that doesn't work, you know,
there's if there's an ethical line that gets crossed. I mean,

(14:12):
every attorney is subject to the the overview of the
of the Supreme Court. That's who regulates us. And so
I'm not giving you legal advice, but I do think
that there are avenues that your attorney can take to
force the other firm to actually pony up that information.
You know, their lean can be properly filed and properly preserved,

(14:32):
but they still then have to comply with the rules
that say the file iszures and they need to turn
over that information.

Speaker 6 (14:39):
So can I file a complaint with the Colorado State
Supreme Court?

Speaker 8 (14:42):
Of course?

Speaker 3 (14:43):
Yeah, absolutely, I would urge you to.

Speaker 6 (14:46):
The client's need to. I mean, the yeah, assumer really
needs to hear John because I'm basically under a rock
right now because lawyers said a lot of Greece and
I have brain damage.

Speaker 3 (14:57):
Yeah, I understand that completely. I would I would urge you,
and I don't. I'm not saying this as a caveat
or to kind of weasel out of things. You absolutely
have that right, but I'm going to advise you to
talk that over at length with your current attorney, because
that's a big step to go to the Supreme Court
and try to invoke you know, disciplinary counsel on a matter.

(15:19):
So you've got an attorney that's part of their job
is to advise you on on all the things that
have to do with this case, and ultimately, this dispute
is part of this case. So please take advantage of
that and sit down and discuss the options that you
have with your attorney. But I really appreciate the call.
I mean, it's a great issue, and it gives the listeners,

(15:40):
you know, some idea of kind of what goes on
in the background. When you hire a law firm, make
sure you hire the right one. You know, these big
law firms are not always the best choice for people
because they do have turnover and there is the possibility
that the attorney you that you think you have on
your case could end up going to another firm or

(16:02):
hiring or starting their own firm, or otherwise not be
your attorney of record. And technically, you know, the lead
attorney in the firm is always also the attorney of record.
But chances are in these big firms, you're you know,
you're not going to have the lead guy having a
whole lot of situational awareness about your case until it
comes time to actually go to trial. But you know,

(16:25):
it's a great issue. But I wish you loved Chris.
Please don't get any more accidents. Okay, you're done, You're
over your limit.

Speaker 8 (16:32):
No more.

Speaker 3 (16:32):
Let's UT's try to move on without doing that one again.
All right, all right, Chris, thanks for the call. We
appreciate it. We're going to go next to Renee that
has an issue with service. Renee, how can we help
you today?

Speaker 10 (16:47):
Right there?

Speaker 11 (16:48):
Actually, I had called and talked to Tom a couple
of weeks ago about a jeep that I had taken
to my local Big O' tire shop because they said
that I needed a new engine in my jeep. Well,
that got done and replaced, and ever since then, my
deep has not been running.

Speaker 12 (17:05):
Right.

Speaker 11 (17:05):
I've it's been it'll September. I think it's going to
be a year. And I kept saying, this is not
running right, there's noises, there's clunking. So they sent it
to a jeep dealership on three different occasions, and all
three occasions that it came back it was still not right.
Things are missing. I don't know how a fuse box

(17:28):
can be put in backwards or whatever, but that was
a case. Anyway, long story short, it's still not running.
I took it to two different independent mechanics and they said,
renee this, this is not right. They didn't put it
together right and it's not safe to drive. And so

(17:50):
now my resolution, according to Big Oh, is you bring
it to a Big OASC certified mechanic, which they I
thought they were because they had that sign on their
wall when you walk in, and they would address the
engine issue nothing else, or they would I could take
it to a mechanic that I trust and they would

(18:13):
give me up to one thousand dollars for repairs, but
I have to sign a waiver saying that they are
no longer responsible for my jeep. And I just feel
like they're trying to get rid of me, pay me off,
and all I want is down to fix my jeep
the way that they got it, and it's not happening
and they're like, well, so many hands were in this, Well, yeah,

(18:35):
you hire, you sent it out to three different dealerships.
At that point, they're your subcontractors, so you guys need
to take responsibility for all this, and they're not. I
just feel like they're trying to give me a thousand
dollars and say, okay, see you later, Renee, but you
have to fign a waiver.

Speaker 13 (18:52):
We're done.

Speaker 3 (18:53):
Yeah, Renee, was just like an asser for me to see. Yeah,
it was just like an aftermarket warranty that was covering
the the engine replacement. Is that why you're going to
run paid?

Speaker 13 (19:03):
I paid for it in cash.

Speaker 11 (19:05):
Oh okay, because I did have an aftermarket warranty, but
they didn't cover the engine. So I was eight out
eight thousand dollars oh for the engine and labor.

Speaker 3 (19:14):
All right, Renee, we're going to try to work through this.
Hang on just a second. We've got to take a
really quick break. We'll be right back.

Speaker 9 (19:23):
Go with a sure thing Denver's Best roofer Excel roofing
dot com. You don't pay a cent until you're content.
Time for an insurance checkup free, no obligation. In comparison,
call Compass Insurance paying too much your coverage at dozens
of insurance companies.

Speaker 14 (19:41):
Find out now three all three seven to seven to
one help.

Speaker 9 (19:44):
You'll think you're his only customer when you choose Frank
durand the real estate man dot com to list your
home with Remax Alliance three all three nine two zero
sixteen twenty two.

Speaker 3 (20:02):
Good afternoon, John Fuller. Here on the Troubleshooter Network. We
are moving rapidly through the first hour.

Speaker 8 (20:08):
Here.

Speaker 3 (20:10):
We are here to help you solve problems, take complaints,
answer questions, give us a call. Three oh three seven
one three eight two five five in that studio today,
I've got myself, John Fuller. I'm a personal injury attorney.
Most of you know me by now. I've been practicing
in the Denver area for twenty three years or something
like that, and I handle accident cases, automobile accidents, premisest liability,

(20:33):
those kind of things have been for near about my
entire career. But I've been exposed to a lot of
stuff and can definitely help out with the random oddball
legal questions. And then also to round out what I
don't know is Brad O'Brien, who is a real estate
and commercial litigation business lawyer here and so between the

(20:53):
two of us, this is a rare opportunity to get
not one, but two different opinions about what is going
to take to help you through your problem. So well
ask you to give us a call. You can also
reach out by email at help at troubleshooter dot com
and we look forward to your calls helping out. Today
we have on the line Renee, and Renee had a

(21:14):
jeep that had a blown engine on it that she
got replaced and she's having a number of issues. Renee,
did I understand that you're about a year after the
replacement at this point? You've been dealing with this that long?

Speaker 11 (21:28):
Yeah, since September I think is going to be going
on year totally.

Speaker 3 (21:32):
Moly. Are you able to drive the jeep right now?
Or is this something that you can't even get on
the road?

Speaker 13 (21:39):
Oh?

Speaker 11 (21:39):
I can drive it, but the two independent mechanics that
I use said, oh no, it's not safe to drive. Well,
the whole time that I was driving it, you know,
big always saying oh no, you're fine, it's safe to drive,
and come to find out that it's not.

Speaker 3 (21:55):
So, I mean, Renee, what is it about it?

Speaker 15 (21:57):
But it's not safe.

Speaker 3 (21:59):
What is it that makes it no safe?

Speaker 11 (22:04):
Just there's bolt nuts like you was saying, the huge box.
How that gets turned around? I have no idea just everything,
and I guess there's a something on the jeep. I'd
actually have to look at what needs to be say
extra installed by jeep itself. It's not something that a

(22:27):
regular mechanic can do.

Speaker 3 (22:28):
Have you tried to take the jeep to a jeep
dealer to get them to look at it.

Speaker 11 (22:34):
Yeah, they sent it out three different times and it
still came back not right. And the general manager at
the time at big Ol says, don't worry all. I mean,
I've got videos, I've got pictures of everything that's gone wrong,
the wiring, harness, I mean just everything it's not right.

Speaker 3 (22:53):
So what are they telling you is going to happen
if you drive it? What is the safety issue that.

Speaker 13 (23:01):
I don't recall?

Speaker 11 (23:03):
They just said not to drive it. It wasn't safe
to maitre.

Speaker 3 (23:06):
You've got some thoughts on this.

Speaker 16 (23:07):
Hi, Rene, this is Deputy deputyd here. I remember your
call from a couple of weeks ago. I kind of
listened to it in the background. Hey, so you know
one of the issues that we had last time, I
think is exactly the same issue I'm having with your
call today, which is we don't really know specifically what
needs to be done that was left undone or specifically

(23:30):
what parts were installed that are now defective. You know
what I mean, There's got to be some kind of
a list that says, here are the eight things that
need to be addressed, here's how much it's going to
cost to address them, and therefore I want Big O
to cover the bill. Did you ever get a chance
to get this thing evaluated over it shared an auto
tech to kind of start afresh, get their eyes on it,

(23:50):
and get Kevin's report with all these line items that
I just mentioned. In fact, we got him here on
the line waiting for us to switch.

Speaker 3 (23:57):
Over to him. Let's go ahead and get Kevin brought
up on the line as well so he can progren have.

Speaker 16 (24:02):
You Have you had a chance. I mean, I know
it's frustrating to take your car to yet another mechanic,
but we really need to start with kind of a
clean slate, if you know what I mean.

Speaker 11 (24:11):
And I understand, Oh, and I understand that I do.
And my issue is, I mean, I've got eleven thousand
dollars in my jeep fire and it just seems like
when they took the jeep apart, my dad and I
went to the to the shop, I mean parts were

(24:31):
everywhere on the on the ground. I mean there was
not anything underneath the hood of my jeep. And they've
got kids there. I don't know who is the as sert.

Speaker 3 (24:42):
Off, I understand, Renee, renee, hang on, hang on.

Speaker 4 (24:45):
Look.

Speaker 16 (24:46):
It could be it could be that this engine project
needs less than a thousand dollars of you know, clean
up work, or it could be that they put in
a crappy engine. We don't know any of that. So
I would love to call Big Oh on your behalf
and talk to them about it. But we need to
present to them what needs to be done. So would

(25:09):
you please consider I realize you're, you know, almost the
year into a very frustrating and extremely expensive process, but
would you consider taking it over to Kevin and having
him provide this report to both you and us, and
then we can start with that.

Speaker 3 (25:25):
Yeah, let's bring Kevin on the line here. Kevin Colkin
have shared an auto tech Kevin, Hey, good morning. How
you know you've been involved in a number of cases
like this. You've got Renee here with a jeep that's
got a new engine in it. She's a year post
engine replacement, and it's just continuing to have issues. She's
hearing one thing from one dealer, one thing from another mechanic,

(25:45):
another thing altogether from Big O, and some of the
people are telling her it's not safe to drive. I mean,
you know, it's it's just it's just hard to believe
when you get so many different people that have so
many different opinions about one vehicle. If Renee brings her
jeep over to you, can you go through that and
come up with a pretty ironclad report of exactly where

(26:08):
things stand, what was done wrong, what was done right,
and what it's going to take to get this thing fixed.

Speaker 17 (26:14):
Yeah.

Speaker 7 (26:14):
Absolutely, we do that all the time.

Speaker 3 (26:17):
And then and what kind of power does that give
the consumer to then go back to her dealership and
say this is the checklist if you will, on what
you didn't do the first time? I mean, how does
that empower the consumer?

Speaker 7 (26:29):
Well, things like that, Or we've also had good success
going back against the warranty companies, you know, for defective
parts or you know, we've had some pretty good luck
getting the warranty involved as well. Right, So we may
not have to go back to the dealer. We may
be able to just circumvent them completely and just go
right through the warranty.

Speaker 3 (26:48):
Right, And the warranty would be great, But in this case,
Renee is out of pocket almost eleven grand. She self
financed this, this replacement.

Speaker 16 (26:55):
John, I think what Kevin was referring to is that
the swapped in engine, oh and associated parts might be
covered by certain warrantsies that came with those parts.

Speaker 3 (27:04):
An engine totally missed that part of it. But yeah,
assuming that there's something wrong with the engine that they
put in there, that that could absolutely be. What I
was hearing Renee say is that there's just crazy stuff
that was done with this. She's talking about an electrical
fuse panel that was put in backwards and and it
just sounds like a less than really super competent, you know,

(27:25):
clean up on this engine replacement? Is that right, Renee?

Speaker 13 (27:30):
Absolutely?

Speaker 3 (27:31):
Okay, Renee, listen, we've we've hit a crossroad where we
want to help, but we just can't help without you
taking the extra step of going over and getting this
vehicle evaluated so that we have some ammunition, some tools
in our box that are going to help us help
you can you can you make an effort to get
that done and then get back to us as soon

(27:52):
as you're compete.

Speaker 11 (27:53):
And what shop was it that you were from, Kevin,
because I know Tom gave me like two of them.

Speaker 7 (27:58):
Yep, yeah, Sheridan, Sheridan Auto Tech.

Speaker 3 (28:01):
And where are you located, Kevin, three blocks.

Speaker 7 (28:04):
West of Wadsworth on Colfax seventy eight sixty four West
coal Fact.

Speaker 16 (28:08):
Would you recommend that Renee call you to make an
appointment or she should just.

Speaker 3 (28:11):
Show up and drop up.

Speaker 7 (28:13):
We'll shut it out so we have ample time to
get through it.

Speaker 3 (28:15):
And yeah, absolutely so, Hey, Renee, write this down. You
can reach Kevin at Sheridan Auto Tech dot com or
his phone number is three oh three four five five
seven two four to two. Three oh three four five
five seven two four to two. Give Kevin a call.
Let's take the steps that we need to take to
actually get your get you some help and hopefully get
this jeep figured out. Okay, appreciate the call, Renee. We

(28:38):
are going to take another quick break here and when
we come back, we're going to be talking with Christy
here and we've got a couple others lined up as well.
If we can help you, give us a call three
O three seven one three eight two five five. Thanks.

Speaker 9 (28:54):
Go with a sure thing Denvers Best Roofer, Excel Roofing
dot com. You don't pay a cent until your content
time for an insurance checkup free, no obligation. In comparison,
call Compass Insurance paying too much your coverage at dozens
of insurance companies find out now three all three seven
to seven to one help. You'll think you're his only

(29:15):
customer when you choose Frank durand the real estate Man
dot com to list your home with Remax Alliance three
three nine two zero sixteen twenty two.

Speaker 3 (29:30):
All right, good afternoon, John Fuller here on the Troubleshooter Network.
We are moving right along here. We've had a couple
of good calls today. We are looking for some more.
We have some open lines here. We are here to
help you. So if you're having problems, I don't care
if it's a scam, if you've been ripped off, if
you're having issues with your work, with a landlord, with

(29:51):
just about anything, your vehicle, give us a call. If
we can't help you, directly. We have the experts online
that can can get you know, can get brought on
board to help you with your particular issue. In the
studio today we have a deputy Dimitri, and we also
have attorney Brad O'Brien who specializes in all things real

(30:13):
estate as well as business and business litigation and that
kind of stuff. So we've got a unique multi year
bank of experience to available for you. So give us
a call. Seven one three eight two five five is
the number to That'seraco three oh three. You can also
email us at helpthatrobshooter dot com with your issues. We're

(30:34):
going to go to the lines right now. We have
Christy on the line. Christy, how can we help today?

Speaker 15 (30:40):
Hi there, thank you for taking my call.

Speaker 3 (30:42):
Of course thanks.

Speaker 18 (30:43):
I have an.

Speaker 15 (30:44):
Insurance claim that I opened up for property theft in
twenty nineteen, Okay, when I moved back into a kind
of discovering that some of my property have been stolen.
So I called USAA, I filed a claim. They asked
for a lot of different things, pictures, a police report,

(31:07):
but a lot of things. That took me a lot
of time to get to them, and so I finally
got everything together. I emailed them, gave them an explanation
as to why it took so long to gather the information,
and they refused to pay me twice. So I got

(31:29):
in touch with AI and got the number of the
executive officers. Talked to a guy named Travis. I explained
the situation that my husband was dying in the hospital
and I was transitioning between two condos, and so it
took me some time to get things together. But when
I finally did, I called and trilled the report and so.

Speaker 3 (31:51):
Christie, just to help me understand here, what type of
property are we talking about and how did it get
stolen from you?

Speaker 15 (32:00):
It was furniture and different small appliances and things. I
was moving my furniture, putting into a moving truck, and
my husband's two children came over and said that they
would be glad to help being that their dad was
lying dying in the hospital. And so I noticed at

(32:23):
the time it seemed kind of strange because I noticed
that some things I didn't think got put into the
moving van, and when I asked the movers about it,
they said, we don't want to get into this. Well,
at that time, his two children were moving some of
my stuff into their truck.

Speaker 3 (32:44):
So that's how these were your not your children, these
are your step children, right, yes, correct? And so they
took items that belonged to both you and their dad
and decided they wanted to keep those items as as
their dad was nearing his passing right?

Speaker 19 (33:05):
Correct?

Speaker 3 (33:05):
And have you confronted them about this?

Speaker 15 (33:09):
I did originally and there was no response. They just
basically hung up on me. I haven't had any contact
with them since.

Speaker 3 (33:19):
Okay, did you follow police report?

Speaker 10 (33:22):
Yes?

Speaker 2 (33:23):
I did, and.

Speaker 15 (33:27):
Well because it apparently criminally because it's over twenty five
thousand dollars in items. They said that there's only a
three year limitations statute limitations, but they would file a
document and it would be on file for the insurance
company to take a look at. And when I wrote

(33:50):
the letter, I gave them the document number for them
to check it out.

Speaker 3 (33:55):
Okay, so what is USAA saying? Are they are they
the claim because it was a family member or what
is going on?

Speaker 15 (34:04):
They said, because of the time frame that's gone by,
that there was a limit of three years. They gave
me an excuse that the Insurance Commissioner of Colorado forbids
them to pay a claim that's that far out, And
so I called the insurance commissioner to talk to him,

(34:27):
and he said that's not true. He said that the
statute is for the insurance company has to pay it
within a certain amount of time, but not that they
can't pay it after that time has gone up. And
then I looked up the statute online and it says
that they can. There's no limit as to when they

(34:50):
can pay out the claim.

Speaker 3 (34:52):
Okay, Christy, I'm gonna need you to hang on just
a second. We got to go to a hard break
here and we'll be right back.

Speaker 9 (35:20):
Go with a sure thing Denver's Best roofer Excel Roofing
dot com. You don't pay a cent until you're content
of time for an insurance checkup free no obligation comparison
call Compass Insurance paying too much your coverage at dozens
of insurance companies find out Now three oh three seven
seven one help. You'll think you're his only customer when

(35:43):
you choose Frank durand the real estate Man dot com
to list your home with Remax Alliance three oh three
nine two zero sixteen twenty two.

Speaker 14 (35:58):
New Advice who you Don't have.

Speaker 1 (36:03):
Come running just as name as we can. Shooter's gonna
help coming man.

Speaker 3 (36:10):
This is the Troubleshooter Show now, Tom Martine, Hey, this
is John Fuller filling in for Tom Martino and Mark
who are both out today on a well deserved day off.
And joining me here in the studio is Attorney Brad
O'Brien and Deputy Dmitri And we are here for you.

(36:30):
Our entire mission is to help you solve problems, take complaints,
and handle issues that are going on in your life.
So give us a call at three oh three seven
poet three eight two five five if you have an
issue that we can help you with. If it's a
challenge with the landlord or a company that you're trying
to do business with, or just about anything, give us
a shot. We'd love to take a shot at at

(36:52):
helping you today. So my background is I am an
attorney here in town. I'm a personal injury attorney. I've
been practicing law for about twenty three years now, I
think under last count. And so if you have an
issue that is focused on accidents, on car insurance, on
policy interpretation, on just about anything that's going on relating

(37:13):
to an automobile, If you have questions about whether or
not you should get certain coverages like uninsured motorists or medpay.
If you have questions about umbrellas, I am here to
answer all of those questions from the perspective of a
guy who uses those coverages. I'm the guy that takes
what you buy from your insurance agent and turns it

(37:34):
into money in the event that you have an accident
and you need to foul a claim against the other
guy's insurance or even against your own insurance company. So
I'm happy to help you with any of those questions.
Just give us a call. Mister O'Brien, on the other hand,
tell us a little bit about your practice, brad Well.

Speaker 5 (37:53):
I help people buy and sell both the residential and
commercial property, and if there's a dispute, I get thing
can go wrong with a transaction, or a boundary line dispute,
or just pretty much anything.

Speaker 3 (38:05):
I can help out with the dispute.

Speaker 5 (38:08):
Many disputes don't have to go to court, but if
they do need to go to court, I do go
to court as well.

Speaker 3 (38:14):
So what is the I mean that all sounds good
in principle, but like just mom and pop real estate purchaser,
I mean what are some of the things that they
should be on the lookout for. When should they call you?
When do you really do your best work in helping
consumers out in transaction?

Speaker 5 (38:35):
Well, I really think everybody needs to have an attorney
when buying or selling any real estate, and in Colorado,
residential buyers and sellers typically do not. They sort of
trust the title company to get things right. But you
cannot really rely on the title company because they're not lawyers,
and they're not your lawyer to get the documents right.
So I review closing documents before the closing and make

(38:57):
sure that everything's good. If they're not, I get them fixed.
This is one of the biggest transactions of someone's life,
is buying or selling a house or some commercial real estate.

Speaker 3 (39:06):
And so you mean to tell me that you can't
rely upon the nice real estate agent to give you good,
solid legal advice about what every provision in that contract means.

Speaker 5 (39:16):
Well, no real estate brokers are not allowed to practice law.
All they can do is really fail and bleak.

Speaker 3 (39:20):
Yeah, is it safe to assume that I'm not the
only guy that's run into realtors that kind of think
their attorneys and think they know how things work. And
think they know how to interpret contracts.

Speaker 5 (39:33):
Well, many push the boundaries of what they're allowed to
say to their buyer or seller clients. But there's definitely
a line, and many real estate brokers know when there's
a truly dispute that needs an attorney to call in
or to recommend that their clients bring in an attorney
at that time, right it.

Speaker 3 (39:54):
You know, just for the average home buyer, give me
an estimate, like out of out of ten or out
of even one hundred, you know, transactions, you're just kind
of standard. We're buying a home, we're getting a loan.
Nothing out of the ordinary, you know. I think out
of the ordinary to me means either atypical properties where

(40:15):
there may be multi use, there may be water issues,
there may be you know, bigger acreage than say the
standard little residential lot. New construction I think is kind
of an atypical deal because it has a lot of
other factors to it. But just a good old, regular
buying a house kind of transaction. Out of say one
hundred of those cases, how many of them will have

(40:37):
issues that come up that really needed to have an
attorney on.

Speaker 5 (40:41):
Well, I find issues on every single transaction, every single transaction.

Speaker 3 (40:45):
Some may be small, maybe on the on the closing statement.

Speaker 5 (40:47):
There's some closing figures that are wrong off by five
hundred dollars.

Speaker 3 (40:51):
But sometimes I.

Speaker 5 (40:52):
Look at the title, I look at the survey, I
look at the contract documents. You check the wrong box
in the contract and you do something that's not local custom,
you might have cost yourself a couple thousand dollars. For example,
if it's the seller custom. For if it's the local
custom for the seller to pay the title insurance, that

(41:14):
could be a two or three thousand dollars, and somebody
might check the buyer pays box on that, and that
just costs somebody just checking that box a couple thousand dollars.

Speaker 3 (41:23):
So when do they need to get you involved? I mean,
when's really the best time?

Speaker 5 (41:27):
I like to be brought in before the contract is signed, okay,
because that's when I can influence the contract. Now, many
don't call a lawyer until after the contract is sign
which is fine, and at that point I can still
help them in the due diligence phase, looking at the
title report, looking at the survey, any other reports that
get done on the property. I can look at appraisal inspection,

(41:49):
and then especially before the closing, we need to make
sure that the closing documents reflect what the contract provided.

Speaker 3 (41:57):
Cool, I've got some more questions. We're going to try
to fin ship with Christy here and go back on
the line.

Speaker 6 (42:02):
Here.

Speaker 3 (42:02):
Christy is calling us today. Just prior to the passing
of her husband, her husband's kids showed up and helped
themselves to some furniture and some other items of personal
property that belonged to I guess belonged to her husband
or collectively were owned by Christy and her husband. And

(42:26):
I guess I'm trying to really understand here, Christy. You
filed acclaim, you did all the right things, you filed
a police report, that kind of stuff. But this happened
back in twenty nineteen, and here we are in twenty
twenty five and you're still going after and trying to
collect on things, and USAA is just telling you we're
not going to cover this. They think it's either it's

(42:49):
a family member, it's either past the deadlines. You didn't
do the right steps to preserve your rights. I mean,
am I kind of summarizing what USAA is telling you.

Speaker 15 (43:01):
When I called originally in twenty nineteen. I was on
a recorded line, okay, and I asked the girl specifically,
do I need to do this with any certain period
of time because I'm unpacking.

Speaker 13 (43:14):
And discovering things that I unpacked, right.

Speaker 15 (43:17):
And she said no, as long as you open the
claim right away, it doesn't matter.

Speaker 3 (43:22):
So when did you officially open the claim?

Speaker 15 (43:26):
October of twenty nineteen, and.

Speaker 3 (43:29):
When did you love that? And when did you finally
supply the documentation to them substantiating your claim.

Speaker 15 (43:36):
I gave them everything in April of this year of
this year.

Speaker 3 (43:43):
So you opened this claim in nineteen and didn't supply
the documentation until twenty twenty five?

Speaker 2 (43:51):
Correct?

Speaker 3 (43:52):
Do you know what the statute limitation is on theft
in Colorado?

Speaker 15 (43:58):
Well from the police, they told me it was three
years to prosecute criminally, Okay, it was a different things.

Speaker 3 (44:07):
It never ends, and they told you it never ends, right, okay.

Speaker 15 (44:13):
But simply that the USA could go after them if
they wanted to.

Speaker 3 (44:18):
Have you thought about trying to do that?

Speaker 18 (44:21):
No, I haven't.

Speaker 15 (44:23):
Why not, Well because it costs a lot of money,
and so I, you know, decided first to try You guys,
do you have do.

Speaker 3 (44:32):
You have proof of the items that you claim that
they stole. Do you have photographs of them taking the
furniture items?

Speaker 15 (44:39):
I have photographs of the items in my kindo and
photographs of the items in their house.

Speaker 3 (44:46):
Okay. And how would you how would you respond if
they say, Dad said I got that piece of furniture
and he wanted me to have it.

Speaker 18 (44:58):
Well, there's a.

Speaker 11 (44:58):
Dad didn't say that.

Speaker 19 (45:00):
Yeah.

Speaker 15 (45:00):
And one of his sons, he my husband was a
race car driver and had a lot of trophies, and
he had given his son three trophies. And I said
to him before he died, I said, is there anything
else that you would like your kids to have? And
he said no, I've given him everything that I want
him to have.

Speaker 3 (45:20):
I said, okay, okay, So all right, here's the deal, Christy.
There is a statute limitation for civil claims. There is
on every civil claim, and yours under the civil theft
statute is also controlled by a statute of limitations. And
I think that, I mean, there's there's arguments that it
could be as short as one year, but I think

(45:42):
the three years is a safe assumption. And and you
would be long past that. And and so you know,
here's the kind of the the bottom line, insurance companies,
you know, listen, I can't imagine a circumstance where they
are going to pay a claim that you didn't supply

(46:03):
any information on for five or six years after the
event that you're you're making a claim for I am sure,
given my experience with USAA, that they had to send
you some correspondence along the way saying, if nothing else,
we haven't heard from you, when are you going to
send this stuff? If we don't hear from you, we're
going to close the claim. And I think they would

(46:24):
be well within their rights after five or six years
to close that claim and not not move any further
on it. I also think the fact that you have
gone past the statute of limitations is going to be
problematic for two for two reasons. One, the insurance company
would not have the ability to go after them and
and try to collect that money civilly, which insurance companies

(46:47):
do when they when they have to pay a claim.
Part of the policy language that you agree to in
the policy is that you'll do nothing to really, you know,
foreclose their ability to go after somebody down the road.
And so when you take no action and you let
that much time go by, the argument could be made
that you didn't perfect that right, you didn't file the
lawsuit that would have preserved their ability to do it.

(47:08):
But also from the standpoint of you personally, I don't
think you could go and file that claim without also
getting kicked out for failing to preserve the statute of limitation.
Statutes of limitations are the date that you have to
file the lawsuit. They don't have to be resolved by
that date, but they have to be filed by that date,

(47:29):
and if you don't file them, the court loses jurisdiction
to hear that matter completely. And so even though you
may be one hundred percent right, with one hundred percent
evidence on your side, the court loses jurisdiction and you're
not able to pursue that anymore. So I think in
this situation that you probably have lost the ability to
go after any sort of recovery on this. And that's

(47:52):
just my opinion, but that's kind of just based on
my experience dealing with these insurance companies for over twenty years.
But Christy, I appreciate the all best of luck to you.
Let us know if you find anything else out on
that we're going to take another break right now. We'll
be right back. Daryl, hang on the line. We'll be
right back with you.

Speaker 9 (48:13):
Go with a sure thing Denver's best roofer Excel Roofing
dot com. You don't pay a cent until you're content.
Time for an insurance checkup free, no obligation. In comparison,
call Compass Insurance paying too much your coverage at dozens
of insurance companies find out now three all three seven,
seven to one help. You'll think you're his only customer

(48:35):
when you choose Frank durand the real estate Man dot
com to list your home with Remax Alliance three oh
three nine two zero sixteen twenty two.

Speaker 3 (48:51):
Good afternoon, if we're back, uh eleven twenty four. This
is John Fuller on the Troubleshooter Network and we are
just truck and ride a long here. We were talking
to bred O'Brien before the break and trying to get
an idea of, you know, from a consumer perspective, like, really,
when should I have an attorney on my side? What

(49:13):
will the attorney do? How much should I plan to
budget for a just typical real estate transaction where there's
nothing really wrong but just for the peace of mind
that knowing everything is pretty okay. Do you have any
loose parameters on something like that?

Speaker 5 (49:30):
Bread Well, I mean certainly on commercial real estate, absolutely
every single transaction should have a lawyer on both sides,
no question, commercial real estate. On the residential I you know,
maybe a million up is pretty common to have them
on both sides. So under a million dollars of buying
and selling homes is where very few attorneys are used

(49:54):
in Colorado. And I'm typically brought into something go sideways,
but you know, I'm adding value from the first minute,
you know it. Pet Meyers wouldn't think of some things
like that. I would pick up on im. And I'm
constantly issue spotting. There's one hundred different issues or more
that could that could pop up in any given transaction.

(50:15):
For example, a shared driveway, that's an issue. That's a
it's an issue that you need to have something documented.
Who's going to you know, all these things about who's
gonna maintain it, who's going to replace it, how is
it going to be shared? All sorts of you know
things like that.

Speaker 3 (50:32):
Yeah, so all the stuff you don't really think about
or you do think about it. And the realtor says oh,
that's no problem. Here's how it works. But you don't
really know until you get until the problem comes up,
and that's when you learn, you know, what the documents
actually say and how these issues are going to be
dealt with when the neighbor parks a boat in the
middle of the shared driveway or or something like that.

(50:53):
So we're going to go through some more of those issues. Darryl,
you are on hold with an issue about Fred Loyer.
What's going on with you, Darryl.

Speaker 8 (51:03):
Yes, well, this is actually my daughter in law's car.
But I'm just trying to get some deal for what's
proper and what's not. I mean, I don't know if
I should give you all this whole story or not.
But you know, in April she had an accident where

(51:24):
another person turned in front of her and there was
the other person's fault. We even had the police report,
but the police would not give her any information at
the scene chased her away.

Speaker 6 (51:34):
Which is really weird.

Speaker 8 (51:35):
But we did finally get the police report and the
guy did go to court and you know, he was
found guilty and blah blah blah, and his insurance has
spread lawyer insurance well, so it wasn't until a month
later that we actually filed, got the file claim filed
with Lawyer insurance, and.

Speaker 18 (51:56):
I do have a.

Speaker 8 (51:59):
Document from Ye Insurance saying, well, these are the two
options we'll give you on the car as far as
the settlement goes, right, Okay, Well, first off, we think
they're kind of lowballing the whole thing a little bit.

Speaker 3 (52:13):
Surprise surprise, of course they are.

Speaker 8 (52:16):
But the real issue, I think, more than anything, is
that they've been other than the initial contact, they've been
unresponsive mostly. Yeah, and until recently, just I think in
the last week possibly there was another woman that she
met into contact that seemed like she was going to

(52:39):
be more helpful, but it just seemed like this was
dragging along, and I'm thinking, well, should we just go
file a complaint with the Colorado Insurance Board or would
that even be helpful?

Speaker 3 (52:51):
Yeah? So first thing first, Daryl, was your daughter hurting
this accident?

Speaker 9 (52:56):
No?

Speaker 3 (52:56):
So we're just talking about property dammage.

Speaker 8 (52:58):
Right, the offender and your base?

Speaker 3 (53:00):
Okay?

Speaker 4 (53:01):
Cool?

Speaker 3 (53:01):
So does your daughter have full coverage on her car?

Speaker 8 (53:06):
No?

Speaker 3 (53:07):
Okay, So when you only have liability, you're a little
bit limited to just the whims of the other insurance company.
The power play in this would be, and I tell
people this all the time. Everybody hates this concept of
taking out a claim on their own insurance, and I
agree that that can be perilous. And everybody's heard the

(53:27):
horror stories about you know, rates going through the roof
and stuff like that. But the reality is that the
law in Colorado says they can't raise your rates for
an accident that you weren't at fault for. And so
frequently when I run up on, you know, companies that
are dragging their feed or they're they're giving me a
crappy valuation or something, I will bring my own insurance

(53:47):
company in and get them to evaluate it and play
both values against each other. If my company came in lower,
obviously nobody would know anything about that. But if they
came in higher, then I use that to go back
to the Fred lawyers of the world to say, hey,
you know, here's two separate you know, objective evaluations of
the value of this car, and you guys are way

(54:10):
off track here. The second thing you can do when
you don't have that power play is demand that they
give you a copy of the report so you know
exactly how they arrived at the value of your car,
go out find your own comps and use that to
suggest what you guys think the value is. And then
at the end of the day, I don't know the

(54:30):
value of your daughter's car. Is it over seven or
eight thousand dollars or how much money are we talking
about here?

Speaker 8 (54:36):
No, it's less than that. I'm mulding the five six
thousand dollars range because of the mileage on it. Now, okay,
twenty ten prius.

Speaker 3 (54:45):
Okay, So what I'm getting at is the value kind
of dictates which court you would go into in the
event that you wanted to go and sue that other
driver yourself. But the fact that they have insurance doesn't
mean you have to go through the insurance company or
even accept that valuation of the of the vehicle. So
your daughter could go into small claims court with the

(55:06):
six thousand dollars car, have her supporting documentation of the value,
and could could simply get a judgment against her with
very little effort, and the insurance company would have almost
no power to do anything other than pay that judgment
in the full amount that the court decided the car
was worth. So that would be you know, my suggestion

(55:27):
on how to really powerplay that. Otherwise, you're absolutely entitled
to follow a complaint with the real estate or the
not the real Estate Commission, but the Division of insurance,
and they are receptive to that. And companies hate when
complaints get filed, and they are responsive to that. So
that is one easy step that doesn't cost a lot
of money. The small claims also doesn't cost a lot

(55:49):
of money, but it takes a little bit more time
and effort and and you know, and and commitment to
follow through and do it the right way.

Speaker 8 (55:56):
But right, okay, very good. Yeah. I mean we did
initially contact talk to her insurance about all this, and
they came back and basically said, well, we can't help
you in that basically anyway share perform and.

Speaker 3 (56:08):
That's pretty typical with just a liability policy. So all right,
that's all I got for you, Daryl, appreciate the phone call.
Hopefully that helps. Good luck, and definitely let us know
how that works out with your daughter. Okay, we are
going to go to a break right now. We'll be
right back.

Speaker 9 (56:26):
Go with a sure thing Denver's Best roofer Excel roofing
dot com. You don't pay a cent until you're content.
Time for an insurance checkup free no obligation. In comparison,
call Compass Insurance paying too much your coverage at dozens
of insurance companies find out now three all three seven
seven to one help. You'll think you're his only customer

(56:48):
when you choose Frank durand the real estate Man dot
com to list your home with Remax Alliance three oh
three nine two zero sixteen twenty two.

Speaker 3 (57:03):
All right, all right, John Fuller here back with the
Troubleshooter Network and we are moving right along here. We've
got some open lines, so give us a call today.
We're here to help you with whatever issue you might
have as it relates to consumer issues, if you've been scammed,
if you've been cheated, if you feel like somebody is
trying to take your money and not provide you the

(57:23):
right level of service, and by all means, give us
a call and let's talk about it. There's a couple
of issues going on that you know, just it kind
of loosely ties in with Brad that I wanted to
talk about today. And obviously one of the big ones
going on right now are these floods in Texas, and
I think this morning, the you know, the death count

(57:45):
is up to like eighty two people and there's still
a couple dozen people missing, and it's just absolutely horrible
the level of loss and stuff. But you know, if
you really dig deep into it and stuff, and then
you start to find out and and Michael Brown went
through this exhaustively this morning and did a phenomenal job
on it. But you start to find out that this

(58:07):
was an area known as the flash flood zone, and
you know, and it's an area that historically has had
this happen before, even with you know, more water and stuff.
And it starts to make me think of I think
a lot of the callers know. I've got family in
Florida and we have for years and years where they

(58:28):
have hurricanes, and I've looked at properties down there where
we're always looking at like the flood zone and the
flood risk and stuff like that. But it's not always
obvious when you look at a property, you know, what
are these risks that are out there? What can you
ensure against? What can you not ensure against? Bread do

(58:48):
you ever get into like flood risk and natural disaster
risk and stuff.

Speaker 5 (58:54):
Like that with with some of the properties that you
work on deals, well, we do look at the flood
zone designation on any purchase.

Speaker 3 (59:02):
Usually it's X.

Speaker 5 (59:04):
You know, if you're outside of a one hundred year
range event range, and you know normally you cannot build
if it's in a designated flood flood zone area. So
I am aware that actually flood maps have changed in
the last ten years, So maybe flood maps that you
saw when you purchase twenty or thirty years ago may

(59:24):
not be relevant. And the difference is that the newer
flood maps that are getting done are showing more properties
included in flood zones.

Speaker 3 (59:33):
So it's an issue, right, I think a more accurate
way to state it is you can build in flood zones.
But where you run into problem is ensuring in flood zones.
And that's you know, half the state of Florida is
in a flood zone of one variety or another. And
the problem that we run into there is a flood
insurance which is a federal program you know, only provides

(59:57):
limited coverage. And when you've got a home that's being finance,
you've got a bank interest that requires there to be
insurance covering everything, you just can't do it unless the
property is built, you know, extremely high above that flood
zone or something like that. But I wouldn't think in
Colorado that you've got a lot of awareness of that.
You know, I think back to the floods that happened here.

(01:00:19):
I don't know if you remember those back in what
thirteen or something, the floods up north. You know, it
was a similar deal where you know, call it one
hundred year flood zone or I heard something this morning,
somebody called it a five hundred year event or something
like that. But even five hundred year events still happen.
And so sometimes, you know, when you find yourself in

(01:00:40):
an area where you've got flowing water and it's subject
to you know, some of these torrential rainstorms and stuff,
there's always that risk and I just don't know how
you can foresee that risk. And some of these transactions
for these weekend homes up in the big Thompson you
know canyon and stuff like that. Where does where do

(01:01:01):
you get involved in helping a buyer kind of navigate
through that stuff?

Speaker 5 (01:01:06):
Well, it's just really a buyer decision. My My role
as an attorney is to advise of apparent risks of
a transaction. For example, buying something that has a flood
zone designation and UH, and some of those risks might
be you may may not be able to ensure the
property for the full building cost and the or if

(01:01:26):
the flood, if the FEMA coverage would be phenomenal and
not cover a whole lot of your your building costs.

Speaker 3 (01:01:35):
That's the part that you take personally. Uh, You're personally
taking a risk on.

Speaker 5 (01:01:39):
So it's then once I've advised the client of the risk,
their decision as a client to to either assume that
risk or move forward or not with that risk in mind.

Speaker 3 (01:01:48):
Where's the line between a duty to disclose and your
duty to you know, to discover facts that you can
find on your own, Like, where where is that line?

Speaker 13 (01:02:00):
Well?

Speaker 5 (01:02:01):
I think the standard of care is to advise a
purchaser to do the standard doc you know, get the
standard documents which are get the title report, do a survey.
I recommend a survey in every transaction, even in like
a subdivision in Denver, get a survey, even if it's
something called an improvement location certificate, which is not really

(01:02:21):
a survey, but at least it shows you where the
where the house is in connection with the boundary lines.

Speaker 3 (01:02:26):
Well, an ILC show easements and that kind of stuff
as well.

Speaker 5 (01:02:29):
Not supposed to you know, and ILC is not a survey.
It's just a certificate that the improvements are on the property.

Speaker 3 (01:02:36):
That's all it is. If you get a drawing, that's
a bonus. So if the property is anywhere other than.

Speaker 5 (01:02:41):
The subdivision in Denver or another city, like it fits
out in the country, or if it's in the hills,
I recommend a full survey, which is an alta survey,
and that shows you a whole lot more information.

Speaker 3 (01:02:52):
It shows you the easements of record.

Speaker 5 (01:02:54):
It shows you easements that might be a parent on
the ground that the surveyor saw, Like if there's a
dirt road going across the property, that's not the source
of an recorded easement. That's something that can be discovered
by walking the property and that would be reflected on
the ALTA survey and an ultra survey can also show

(01:03:15):
that the flood zone designations. A big property might have
a couple of different flood zone designations and it would
show you the parts that's in the flood zone.

Speaker 3 (01:03:23):
And the parts that's not. Got you. I've got a
couple more questions on that subject, Larry, hang on the line.
We're going to be right back after this break to
handle your question. And a couple more so, hang.

Speaker 9 (01:03:34):
On go with a sure thing Denver's Best roofer Excel
Roofing dot com.

Speaker 14 (01:03:44):
You don't pay a cent until you're content.

Speaker 9 (01:03:49):
Time for an insurance check up free no obligation comparison
call Compass Insurance paying too much your coverage at dozens
of insurance companies find out now three all three seven
to seven to one help. You'll think you're his only
customer when you choose Frank durand the real estate Man
dot com to list your home with Remax Alliance three
all three nine two zero sixteen twenty two.

Speaker 3 (01:04:14):
Hey, good afternoon, John Fuller here with the Troubleshooter Network,
getting back to the show. We've got a couple of
callers lined up we're going to get to before the
end of the hour break. If you have an issue
that you'd like help on, give us a call today.
The number is three oh three seven one three eight
two five five. In the studio with me is Brad O'Brien,
real estate Attorney extraordinaire and Deputy Dimitri So we've got

(01:04:39):
you covered on both ends. Give us a call, we'd
be happy to help. Larry, you have a question on
ten thirty one exchanges. What's going on, Larry, Well.

Speaker 19 (01:04:50):
Mister O'Brien, I'm kind of interested in doing this. I've
got some agricultural land in western Nebraska. I'm kind of
tired of battling farm prices and rising cost I've got
a good tenant that's renting the land and bringing good crops.

(01:05:17):
But you know, you're always dealing with hail and don't
know if you're going to sell at a low price
or high price. So I'm kind of wondering about an exchange.
And I've got a guy that had bought a cousin's property.

Speaker 8 (01:05:33):
That borders mine, and.

Speaker 19 (01:05:37):
He's pursuing my interest in selling to him. But I've
had control of it ever since my father passed back
in two thousand and seven, and I'm having a hard
time finding out exactly what we took a step up
in basis when he died. I don't know exactly that number.

(01:06:01):
What we're thinking around five hundred dollars an acre. There's
three hundred and twenty acres, so a half section. Now
the property is maybe selling for upwards of thirteen hundred

(01:06:23):
dollars an acre.

Speaker 3 (01:06:24):
Okay, so.

Speaker 19 (01:06:27):
I'm lucky to see how ten thirty one exchanges work.
I've read a little bit.

Speaker 3 (01:06:34):
So let me just bring some of the listeners up
to speed here. I'm not a tax attorney, and so
I'm just going to give you my my kind of
loose overview and bradle jump in here and help us
out as well. But a ten thirty one exchange is
a creature of the irs that allows you to sell
one investment property and then roll the proceeds and the

(01:06:56):
gain of that property into another investment property and defer
the taxation of that gain until some point down the road.
And there are very detailed rules about designation of properties
and timeframes that you have to actually close the new
sale and stuff. When he talks about a step up basis,

(01:07:18):
when your dad passed as the beneficiary of your dad
leaving that land to you, you're entitled to a step
up in basis, which means your basis in the property
steps up to the actual value of the property at
the time of death. And so that saves you a
good chunk of taxes. If he had held it for

(01:07:39):
a long time and it was highly appreciated for your dad.
But you've also done well in the sense that it
was five hundred then and it's thirteen hundred and acre now,
so you're going to have a significant gain. And so
you know, the advice that I can tell you is
the risk in a ten thirty one is that you

(01:08:00):
you make a mistake and miss one deadline by one
day or one designation that's not just perfect, and then
it throws the whole thing into into a situation where
the IRS would disqualify the ten thirty one and you
get taxed on that entire amount of gain and stuff.
And so there are ten thirty one companies that you

(01:08:23):
can use that will actually assist and walk you through that.
There are attorneys that specialize in ten thirty one exchanges
that can also assist you in that. Brad, do you
have some thoughts on ten thirty one exchanges and some
of the risk involved there?

Speaker 5 (01:08:37):
Well, many of the deals that I'm involved in are
ten thirty one exchanges, but being a creature of the
tax code section ten thirty one of the IRS Tax Code,
it really falls under the tax advice which is out
of my area.

Speaker 3 (01:08:51):
But in general, you're selling a property.

Speaker 5 (01:08:54):
And then your exchange intermediary, the person who's assisting you,
will tell you what you're rollover portion is, and that's
the portion that goes into the new property and becomes
your basis there and normal ten thirty one exchanges, you
sell your property first, and then you buy the replacement property,
and you've got a deadline to like forty five days

(01:09:16):
to identify three potential properties that you're going to purchase,
and then you've got some additional time. I think it's
like six months to close on the final purchase. Now
you can do it backwards ten thirty one reverse ten
thirty one, where you're actually buying the replacement property first
and selling your property second, and that has different timelines.

Speaker 3 (01:09:34):
What sort of property are you looking at buying, Larry.

Speaker 19 (01:09:37):
Well, I've looked at some raw land in Colorado.

Speaker 3 (01:09:45):
Okay, that.

Speaker 19 (01:09:48):
Is all in a CRP program, But I need to
further investigate what their payments are going forward and the
term of that payment.

Speaker 7 (01:10:03):
And I don't know what you can exchange for.

Speaker 19 (01:10:07):
I don't think it has to be liked to like
like agricultural to agricultural to be you know, agricultural to
a house to an apartment to a right condo to
can go across state lines.

Speaker 17 (01:10:20):
I understand.

Speaker 3 (01:10:21):
I guess that's consistent with my understanding. It doesn't have
to be like kind property, but it does have to
be an investment property that is going to be you know,
and and I don't even know if it has to
be income producing investment property, but certainly purchased with a
long term gain in mind.

Speaker 5 (01:10:39):
Yeah, Brad, do you believe big land qualifies if it's
held for a business use?

Speaker 3 (01:10:44):
You're certainly CRP payments with an income stream, But anything else, Glary,
we're coming up against the hard break here. Is there
anything else in particular you want to stay over the
break you're welcome to?

Speaker 19 (01:10:59):
Well, not necessarily particularly, I guess, unless we would really
tail into some longer sort of conversation.

Speaker 3 (01:11:09):
But I think I appreciate the call.

Speaker 9 (01:11:12):
Larry uh go with a sure thing Denver's Best roofer
excel roofing dot com.

Speaker 14 (01:11:17):
You don't pay a cent until you're content.

Speaker 9 (01:11:23):
Time for an insurance checkup free no obligation comparison call
Compass insurance paying too much your coverage at dozens of
insurance companies find out now three oh three, seven to
seven to one help you'll think you're his only customer
when you choose Frank durand the real estate man dot
Com to list your home with Remax Alliance.

Speaker 14 (01:11:41):
Three oh three nine two zero sixteen twenty two.

Speaker 17 (01:11:44):
Yeah, Ri.

Speaker 1 (01:11:51):
News you need that's who you don't.

Speaker 2 (01:11:54):
Have to.

Speaker 1 (01:11:56):
Run ins as care. The Shoot's gonna help.

Speaker 3 (01:12:01):
Come man, This is the Troubleshooter Show. Now, Tom Martino, Hey,
good afternoon. John Fuller here filling in for Mark Major
and Tom Martino, who are enjoying a well deserved day
off today. Joining me in the studio is Deputy Dimitri
As always, and today we have a special guest in

(01:12:22):
Brad O'Brien, real estate attorney, who is here to talk
about issues that go into helping to facilitate real estate
transactions for buyers and sellers and also just general business
litigation issues. So if you have any questions that are
oriented to that sort of practice, take advantage of Brad
being here in the studio, give us a call with

(01:12:44):
your questions. There's no time like the presence we have
open lines. The studio phone number here is three oh
three seven one three eight two five five. I, as
most of you know, am a personal injury attorney, and
for the last twenty something years, I've beencticing solely as
a plaintiff's personal injury lawyer. That means that I represent

(01:13:06):
people like you that have been involved in accidents, that
have gotten injured, work through their claims against the insurance
companies and the drivers that caused those accidents. And if
you have any questions that are along the lines of
accidents and insurance proper coverages, that kind of stuff, by
all means, give us a call. We'd be happy to

(01:13:27):
work through those issues. On top of those, we're here
to handle just about any question. We take questions, solve problems,
take complaints. We're here to help you with any of
your issues. And in addition to Brad and myself and
Deputy Dmitri, we have a whole cadre of professional experts
out there that are just a phone call away to

(01:13:48):
help you with your issues. So give us a call.
We are here to help you and we look forward
to doing so. Today is July seventh, following the big
Fourth of July weekend. Let's talk about fireworks. A little
bit I heard through the Great Vine. Actually it wasn't
the Great Vine. It was on the Michael Brown show

(01:14:08):
that our illustrious producer might have been involved in the
launching of some illicit fireworks this weekend.

Speaker 20 (01:14:17):
I watched them, you watched them, Yeah, but I think
there was some blood relatives involved in the curemen have
said fireworks possibly possibly, And and did you properly dispose
of those fireworks afterwards.

Speaker 4 (01:14:34):
Like immediate calling put it in a bucket of water? Yeah, yeah, exactly.
And there was a fun one.

Speaker 3 (01:14:40):
But take them to the neighbor's yard, I mean, what
did you.

Speaker 21 (01:14:44):
Unfortunately, one of the had like twenty something different rockets
and it didn't all of them.

Speaker 4 (01:14:50):
Didn't go off. Yeah, So we had to be very
careful with that one.

Speaker 21 (01:14:55):
And one of the dumb teenagers went up there and
did light the rest of them, but they all went
off at the same time, so the entire box caught
on fire. So then of course the neighborhood dads come
out with fire extinguishers and hoses and everything. So everything
was everything was taken care of, Everything was fine.

Speaker 3 (01:15:12):
Properly supervised, no alcohol involved one of that stuff.

Speaker 4 (01:15:17):
Yeah, yeah, properly supervisors.

Speaker 3 (01:15:20):
I used to live out in the country out east
of Brighton for a number of years and we had
we had like horse property and stuff. But every year,
I mean, I swear these guys must have spent at
least a month's salary on a truckload of contraband from Wyoming.
And the thing about it is one was a cop

(01:15:40):
and the other was a fireman. But you would have
thought it was an Iraqi war zone or something. I
mean the mortars and stuff that were going off. And
every single year, without fail, somebody would send something up
that would catch my horse pasture on fire. And so
as just a matter of routine, we would sit on
the front porch and watch this stuff go up and

(01:16:03):
watch it come down, and as soon as the fire
would start, we'd run out there with a hose and
put the thing out. It was not fine, you know,
but it was.

Speaker 7 (01:16:12):
It was.

Speaker 3 (01:16:12):
It was what it was. But welcome to Colorado. Then
you've got the uh, you've got the Wyoming version of that,
where they stand on opposite sides of a field and
literally shoot bottle rockets and Roman candles at each other.

Speaker 21 (01:16:25):
I'm not saying there wasn't any Roman candle war between
the teenagers and just you know, oh my goodness, that
is crazy.

Speaker 3 (01:16:33):
You know, I have personally seen homes that had burned
to the ground because of fireworks that people just throw
into a trash can, and and they assume that once
they're out, they're out, and and frequently those things will reignite.
And like you said, there are unfired ones that sit
there in summer.

Speaker 4 (01:16:51):
Per careful with on those ones.

Speaker 3 (01:16:53):
Yeah, it's crazy. And those people that go up and
light them to try to get the last three or
four to go off sometimes end up pulling back an
up and you know, have a few fewer fingers and
stuff like that than they started with. And it's just
it's just crazy. It's a lot of risk and a
lot of danger. If you guys are still out there
with your truckloads of fireworks and you're still setting them off,

(01:17:14):
as seems to be the case around my house, please
dispose of them properly. It's just it's just not worth it.
And these fires go up so fast, it's so dry,
and the wind blows and it just takes two seconds
to have a whole house go up in flames.

Speaker 21 (01:17:31):
Don't just immediately put them into the garbage can, so
co them first, use your hose, use a bucket, something,
be smart about it.

Speaker 3 (01:17:37):
Yeah, yeah, I mean where I used to live. Nobody
ever picked them up until at least the next day.
If they didn't catch my ditch on fire of the field.
They were safe, you know, in the driveway or the
road wherever they fell and stuff, and it was it
was fine, but just crazy, you know, these mortars and
stuff that go off or just huge bombs that go up,

(01:17:59):
So so be careful out there. The other thing I
wanted to bring up, I was welcome this morning. We
have Amazon Prime Days starting up in a day or two,
and I actually got an email first thing this morning
that that is one of the biggest days for Amazon
fraud and phishing attacks for Amazon accounts and stuff of

(01:18:23):
any other time of the year. And so it's gotten
so bad that even Amazon is sending out emails. Maybe
that was a pre phishing email, I don't know, but
it's crazy that Amazon has to send out things saying,
no matter what, don't give your information to anybody, don't
accept a phone call asking for, you know, identifying information

(01:18:45):
about your accounts, don't send any passwords, don't verify your
address on an email, don't do anything that somebody reaches
out to you about in these online transactions, and so
when we come back from the break, I found a
video that I wanted to share with the listeners, and
it is truly a frightening video. It deals with the

(01:19:08):
ability of AI generated people to sell you things, to
scam you, to take your money to do other things.
I'm going to tell you where to find this video
for yourself. I want you all to go watch it
and listen to it. It is truly frightening. So we
will be right back after this break and we'll talk
about that.

Speaker 9 (01:19:33):
Go with a sure thing Denver's best roofer Excel Roofing
dot com. You don't pay a cent until you're content
than time for an insurance checkup free, no obligation. In comparison,
call Compass Insurance paying too much your coverage at dozens
of insurance companies find out now three all three seven
seven one help. You'll think you're his only customer when

(01:19:55):
you choose Frank durand the real estate Man dot com
to list your home with Remax Alliance three all three
nine two zero sixteen twenty two.

Speaker 3 (01:20:12):
All right, good afternoon, we're back. This is John fuller
On behalf of the Troubleshooter Network, and before the break
I was talking I stumbled across a video this morning,
and you know, we all hear about AI and you know,
artificial intelligence. Do you use AI in your practice? Bread? No,
not yet.

Speaker 17 (01:20:31):
No.

Speaker 3 (01:20:32):
I mean it's getting to where it's just everywhere you go,
and people are using it and you know, every conceivable
good way to get information out and to help the
public and stuff, but they're also using it for every
bad way possible. I was recently turned onto a service
that was being promoted as a way to get videos

(01:20:55):
out there for your company and to You could give
it a script and you could actually pick the spokesperson.
You could pick the language, you could pick the accent,
you could pick any variable that you wanted, and they
would actually produce a video of this person speaking. And
it was okay, It wasn't phenomenal, but you know, if

(01:21:17):
you were trying to get a lot of content out there,
you know, you could certainly use that way. And apparently
there's some benefits to having a lot of AI out
there from a Google you know, seo standpoint. But this
morning I stumbled onto a website and a video that
I think is just amazing, And it's amazing in a

(01:21:40):
scary kind of way because what it's showing you is
how dang realistic the AI technology has gotten and its
ability to put out fake people giving out fake or
bad information to try to scam you. And so I
immediately sent it to my mom, and my wife was
going to say it to her mother, because you know,

(01:22:02):
our parents are getting to the age where they just
simply are pretty gullible about stuff, especially on the computer
and the iPad and all this crazy stuff, and they
just don't know always whether to click a link or not.
And my mom called me a couple of weeks ago
and there was some suren going off in the background
from some you know, malicious software that she had clicked

(01:22:25):
on that it was locking up her thing that was
trying to get her to call Microsoft Tech support, which
of course it was an Apple device so Microsoft had
nothing to do with it. But thankfully she called me
instead of calling the number on the screen that was
being you know, broadcast as the only way to unlock
her device and stuff. But I do encourage you guys
to go out and find this video, and if you

(01:22:46):
go to YouTube, write this down and put this in
the little search term and it'll come up for you.
Write this down. It's called watch this fake AI video scam,
and if you type that into YouTube, it'll bring up
this video. And if you're like me, you're going to
be shocked at how realistic the people on this video are.

(01:23:09):
It's only about three minutes long, but it's one example
after another after another of absolutely fictitious people making pitches
for things that you've likely heard in your private life,
trying to either get your name, your private information, your money,
or otherwise. And so I highly encourage you to go

(01:23:29):
out there and look at this video and send it
to the people that you love and your family to
say look out, this is a bad deal out there,
and try not to get scammed yourself. So that's my
two cent community service message of the day. We all
just looked at it here in the studio and we're shocked,
once again have anything like that.

Speaker 16 (01:23:49):
Man, I'm so glad you showed me this video. It
is by far the best, not only the best I've
ever seen. I didn't realize they can get this good
sire to today was Mark Major who shared some of
these tools with me, and then they actually look fake.
But what you just uncovered is stunning and I can
only imagine how good this will be in just another

(01:24:11):
year or two or less. And you know, it really
is chilling to think of what the perverts are going
to do with this technology. Not just the scammers, but
the perverts. So it is just off the scale realistic.

Speaker 3 (01:24:26):
It is fascinating me. Ask is there a way to
tell that this is an AI video versus real.

Speaker 16 (01:24:30):
You have to look real carefully. But on one of
these that really caught my eye is the one that
was intentionally degraded to make it appear as a convenience
store surveillance video. So it makes it and there's a
guy stealing like a package of donuts or something in
that video. So when they intentionally degrade it to impose

(01:24:51):
that context on the subject matter, it becomes indistinguishable from reality.

Speaker 3 (01:24:57):
Yeah, but there was another one that, if you think
about these exis floods and stuff, was a fire fire person. Yeah,
a lady of female firefighter that was out there soliciting
like disaster relief. And I mean, you could not get
more realistic than that lady was that one was might
as well been standing, you know, standing in front of you.

(01:25:20):
You would not have known her as a fake at all.
And so I was truly impressed and shocked by the
quality of this video. So once again go out there
and look it up and see for yourself. Just search
on YouTube watch this fake AI video scam, and I
think you'll you'll be amazed at it if you if
you look at it, want to call us with your

(01:25:41):
comments by all means to do that. The phone number
here in the studio is is three O three seven
one three eight two five five. I've loved to hear
your your comments on this as well. Let's go to
the phone's real quick. Roger, you have an issue with
a Circle K car wash. What's going on? Roger?

Speaker 10 (01:25:56):
Yes, I do.

Speaker 3 (01:25:58):
What's happened in Roger?

Speaker 2 (01:25:59):
Well, well, what's happen? And it's on the twelfth of April.
I went to the Circle K and I usually just
get the regular car wash without the wheels. This time
I decided to pay he lost your money and get
the wheels done.

Speaker 3 (01:26:14):
Okay.

Speaker 2 (01:26:15):
I went in Will's cut the car wash done, I
drove straight home, got all my car, went and looked
down at my wheels and noticed that my rims were
scraped up.

Speaker 8 (01:26:26):
Oh.

Speaker 2 (01:26:27):
I drove immediately back to Circle K. Told the lady
at the reception desk there that what had happened. She said, Okay,
I'm gonna call the owner the score and she's going
to get back with you. The owner's score of the
store never.

Speaker 17 (01:26:43):
Got back with me.

Speaker 2 (01:26:45):
I kept calling and going back there, and then they
told me okay, we submitted a claim and they gave
me the claim number and everything. I went in and
kept calling.

Speaker 8 (01:26:56):
Then on June.

Speaker 2 (01:26:58):
Or twelfth of June, they sent me a text saying
that they investigated everything and they find that they're not
at fault for anything because there's no other car damage
claiming there was damage, and I said, well, did the
cars get their wheels washed? And they didn't respond. The

(01:27:19):
owner claimed that she spoke to me, which was a lie,
and I told them that that wasn't true. Now my
right front wheel it says my tired monitor thing comes
on warning light then that there's a problem my tracks
and control.

Speaker 3 (01:27:41):
Roger, how old is your car?

Speaker 2 (01:27:43):
It's a twenty eighteen. I bought it new and I
always took it to the GMC dealer to get worked on.

Speaker 8 (01:27:51):
Right.

Speaker 3 (01:27:54):
So, Roger, these things are kind of are kind of
tricky here. You know. The the general rule is, of course,
you know the owner of a piece of equipment that
is being used to wash your car would be liable
if it damaged your car. I mean that that kind
of goes without saying. However, for a non essential service

(01:28:15):
like that, they can get you to wave their responsibility
by putting up signs that say, as a condition of
you using the car wash or whatever it is, that
you agree to wave you know, simple negligence, which would
would probably cover, you know, if there was some sort
of I don't know, material on the brushes or something

(01:28:39):
that that scraped your your wheels or anything. Do you
recall seeing anything like that on either the ticket that
you bought to get the code to go in there,
or a sign around the car wash.

Speaker 2 (01:28:52):
I have a copy of the ticket. There's nothing saying that.
I even realized that phone. I went back to the
car wash and looked around. I took pictures of the area.
There's nothing indicate that any responses that any damages my responsibility.
And seems like they just blew me off pretty much.

(01:29:16):
What I called them and told them that, or you know,
told them that.

Speaker 3 (01:29:19):
Look.

Speaker 2 (01:29:20):
I checked with gmc dillar and they said as six
hundred and some dollars per rim, they claimed that. You know,
after a few months they went back in and said, no,
we don't see where we caused any damage. We check, well,
six hundred dollars for each rim, for each.

Speaker 3 (01:29:41):
Rim, and all four of them are destroyed.

Speaker 2 (01:29:44):
All four of them had been scraped up and scratched.
But now the problem is my trash control monitor comes
on and now.

Speaker 18 (01:29:54):
My right front wheel.

Speaker 2 (01:29:56):
Is not even showing any air pressure, even though there's
their pro You're in it, okay, And I'm kind of
like stuck here.

Speaker 21 (01:30:06):
Well, it seems like to me, I'm not a car
guy at all whatsoever. So about twenty four hundred dollars
for a tire pressure monitor system that that seems like
a pretty good deal there, my friends, So you you've
got extra money to spend, and I'm not.

Speaker 3 (01:30:19):
I'm not a car guy.

Speaker 4 (01:30:20):
I don't know what rims would have to do with
the traction.

Speaker 3 (01:30:23):
Yeah, I don't think that's what he's saying, that the
rims were twenty four hundred dollars. The tire pressure monitoring
system is a little device that goes inside the tire.

Speaker 21 (01:30:32):
But that's not work, it's what he's calling it's not
working now because of the car. So if you have
a rim from the car wash to fix this should
go far enough.

Speaker 3 (01:30:43):
Yeah, you know, listen in any car wash, I think
that a tp MS system is it's hard to really
destroying a car wash because it's inside your tire. And
so I don't know that the water from a car
wash or a brushing, you know, event, would would actually
cause that. That may just be a coincidence that had

(01:31:04):
happened at the same time. But you know, a trip
to your dealership would probably be the first step to
figure that out.

Speaker 2 (01:31:10):
Have you.

Speaker 3 (01:31:11):
Have you insisted that they give you the the insurance
information for the circle.

Speaker 2 (01:31:15):
K No, sir, I didn't know that that was a possibility.
All idea was contacted. Then my call the uh yeah,
so global okay, and global capability.

Speaker 3 (01:31:30):
I got you, So, Roger, hang on a second. We
got to take a quick break. I'll be right back
with some ideas on how to proceed from here. Okay,
go with a.

Speaker 9 (01:31:44):
Sure thing Denver's best roofer Excel roofing dot com. You
don't pay a cent until you're content. Time for an
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insurance companies. Find out now three all three seven to
seven to one help. You'll think you're his only customer

(01:32:06):
when you choose Frank durand the real estate man dot
com to list your home with Remax Alliance three all
three nine two zero sixteen twenty two.

Speaker 2 (01:32:31):
All right, good.

Speaker 3 (01:32:31):
Afternoon, John Fuller here back with the Troubleshooter Network. We
are lavin studio with attorney Brad O'Brien, real estate expert
and Deputy Dmitri. We're talking with Roger went to the
Circle k and got a car wash, and when he
got home, he discovered that his wheels had been damaged
purportedly from the car wash, and he's evaluating kind of

(01:32:55):
next steps and where to go from here. Roger, you
have full coverage insurance on your car?

Speaker 8 (01:33:03):
Yes?

Speaker 13 (01:33:03):
I do?

Speaker 3 (01:33:04):
And and do you know off the top of your
head what your deductible is for this particular type of damage?

Speaker 2 (01:33:12):
I really don't.

Speaker 18 (01:33:14):
I don't.

Speaker 2 (01:33:15):
Like I said, it's was a little bit of scrape
on some on a couple of them, but as major
scrapes on the others.

Speaker 3 (01:33:25):
Have you gone to a Yeah, have you gone to
a wheel store to see if there's any way to
fix those scrapes or have them buffed out or polished. No,
I have it yet, So I guess my first thought is,
you know, go and see what your damages are. I mean,
you don't just replace wheels for a few scratches. If

(01:33:45):
they can be fixed, that's clearly the you know, the
next step for you, and I think a wheel store
would be the best place to go look and at
least get an estimate and see what you're looking at.
Then at that point you have two real options. You
can look at your own insurance company. But the downside
of filing a property claim on your own company is
that they're going to charge you a deductible. And so

(01:34:06):
if it was going to cost a couple hundred bucks
to get that buffed out, you may have a five
hundred or one thousand dollars deductible on your car insurance.
Then of course there's no reason to ever file that
under your own policy because the deductible is never going
to get met, so they're not going to pay you.
You'll just have to come out of pocket with that.
The second course of action would be to go against

(01:34:28):
circle k itself, and the best case in my mind
would be if you could get them to tell you
who their insurance company is, and you could file a
claim and fight it out with them if they don't
agree to give you that information. And giving you that
information doesn't mean that they're going to pay you. It
doesn't mean you're going to be successful. It just means
that you have the name of the people that you

(01:34:49):
can go file the claim with. The other option is
along the same lines. It's just simply to file an
action in small claims court against that circle k get
them served according to to the rules, and go to
court with your photos and your estimates and everything, and
give it your best shot. The challenge I think you're
going to run into Roger is a proof problem. The

(01:35:11):
obvious response to any allegations that their car wash damaged
your car is being able to prove how good it
looked before you went into the car wash, and that
the damage came on that day, at that time, from
that car wash. So I think that's going to be
a little bit challenging. If I had an insurance policy
that was my insurance company, and my deductible was low

(01:35:33):
enough to eat up the cost of repairing those wheels,
that probably be the way that I would go just
to avoid having to fool with it myself, and then
they could turn around and go after the circle k
and do what's called subrogation, trying to get repaid from
the insurance company. So that's all I got for you, Roger.
I hope that helps. Thank you for calling us, and

(01:35:53):
good luck and let us know how it works out. Okay,
we are going to next go to Ernie. Ernie has
an issue with income tax. We'll try to get started here.

Speaker 8 (01:36:02):
Ernie.

Speaker 3 (01:36:02):
What is going on with you today?

Speaker 13 (01:36:03):
Sir?

Speaker 17 (01:36:05):
Well, I got macular degeneration and I in the last
three years I became bigally blind, okay, And I haven't
fould my taxes yet for this last year, and I
was just wondering. I did have a site increase in
my tax because of the maximum deduction away recall it

(01:36:26):
from my personal deduction investments. Oh okay, we take out
so much money when you reach certain age, yes sir, yes, sir,
And so you know, four hundred dollars five hundred dollars
a month I was paying to my bank. So it's
going to up my in my income a little. And

(01:36:47):
I'm just wondering if they have any deduction for blind
people and as.

Speaker 3 (01:36:51):
Far as your taxes ago, well, that is a great
question and one that I have not previously run into.
I'm going to get you to hang on over the break, Ernie.
We're going to try to get our expert on the
line to help address that with some degree of authority
so we can get you a good answer. Can you
hang on there, Ernie for a few minutes for us, Yes, sir,

(01:37:12):
all right, appreciate it, Partner, hang tight. When we get
back from the break, we have the long awaited segment
of questions from Dimitri, and we're going to put mister
Brad O'Brien on the spot with every Dimitri subpart multi
level question that he can come up with. So, if

(01:37:33):
you have any issues in the meantime, give us a call.
Three h three seven one three eight three five five
is the telephone number to get into the studio. Here.
We are here to answer all of your questions on everything,
not just those related to personal injury or real estate law,
but really any questions. So if you have an issue

(01:37:53):
with your own challenges, anybody trying to scam you, if
you happen to have watched that YouTube video we just
put out the address for and have some comments on that.
We would love to talk to you about just how
amazingly accurate and realistic those those quote unquote people were
on those videos. So give us a call, we'd be

(01:38:13):
happy to speak with you and we'll be right back
with the rest of Ernie's issues and hopefully get some
questions for him.

Speaker 9 (01:38:20):
Hang on, go with a sure thing Denver's Best roofer
Excel Roofing dot com.

Speaker 14 (01:38:29):
You don't pay a cent until you're content than.

Speaker 9 (01:38:35):
Time for an insurance check up free no obligation comparison
call Compass Insurance paying too much your coverage at dozens
of insurance companies find out now three all three, seven
to seven to one help. You'll think you're his only
customer when you choose Frank durand the real estate Man
dot com to list your home with Remax Alliance three
all three nine two zero sixteen twenty two.

Speaker 3 (01:39:13):
All right, good afternoon, John Fuller back with the Troubleshooter Network.
We are live in the studio trying to work through
some issues Ernie. We're trying to get a expert on
the line. It'll be just another couple of minutes. I've
got some information for you that, but I'd really rather
get it directly from the expert, so continue to hold

(01:39:34):
for just the next couple of minutes. Dmitri has some
questions for our expert, Brad O'Brien, who is a real
estate attorney, live in the studio here, so Dmitri lay
it on him.

Speaker 16 (01:39:47):
Brad, let's talk about beat neighbors for a minute. You know,
specifically what comes to mind or these occasional news stories
you hear about hoarders whose homes tend to blow up
or burn down and take some neighbors with them. So
I'm wondering from the perspective of somebody who a hypothetical
person who lives next door to one of those hoarder homes,

(01:40:08):
and the yard is full of garbage, and the home
looks even worse, and maybe the residents are mentally ill,
and they play loud music and they just cause all
kinds of mayhem. What can be done not to help
those people get a better lifestyle, but to protect the
neighbor's interests in the neighbor's own property in terms of

(01:40:31):
the effects on their health, their safety, their enjoyment of life,
their enjoyment of their own property. Not to mention the
potential resale value of that home. I mean, who's going
to be able to sell a house that's next door
to one of these and realize full market potential? So
what can actually be done.

Speaker 5 (01:40:49):
Well, practically speaking, when there's a hoarder next door and
it's visible from the street, you want to get the
problem fixed. So you're going to report to the housing
er z owning authority and is most likely going to
be a violation of his zoning ordinance and get the
basically the law enforcement against them, which would start with
probably a notice of violation and fines, and they could

(01:41:12):
actually get taken to court by the county or city
for that violation and hopefully that should resolve the problem.
As far as the civil action against the hoarder by
neighbors for property value reduction, I would think that in
terms of think of that in terms of being a
nuisance claim, But nuisance claims you need to have something

(01:41:33):
that leaves the property of the offending person and goes
on to the property of It's not just visual in
my mind. For example, if there's a factory that's belting
out smoke, Okay, those air particles, bad particles are going
to other properties. That's that can be a nuisance. There
needs to be some physical manifestation. So I'm not sure

(01:41:54):
that just the seeing hoarding situation next door is going
to give you grounds for a new But if there's
some runoff to other properties of chemicals, okay, there you've
got something leaving that property and going on to neighbors' properties.
That's a physical manifestation that would be the basis for
a nuisance claim.

Speaker 16 (01:42:13):
Bred Not long ago, I want to say, maybe a
couple of months ago. I saw a story on one
of the local news channels about a problem guy who
lives in this cul de sac in one of the
northern suburbs, and he put up a sign. He put
up this huge banner on his house and it says, hey,
I stay up all night. I'm paraphrasing, but I drink

(01:42:34):
a lot, I do drugs. My friends come over, we
stay up all night, we play loud music. And he
did this while one of his neighbors was trying to
sell his home. What if anything can I don't know
how that story was resolved because I never saw any
more references to that particular event, but this guy, clearly,
you know, huge d bag and he is doing a

(01:42:55):
really effective job at derailing his neighbor's sale. What, if anything,
think can be done in a situation like that.

Speaker 5 (01:43:02):
Well, first of all, it could be a First Amendment exercise.
But if you're if this was in a homeowners association,
there may be UH covenants that are that apply to
all the neighbors about doing things like this. I mean,
there there are protections for in in the the condo laws,

(01:43:22):
the HIA laws that say you can have an American
flag UH, and you can you can post that. But
as far as being able to put up a political
statement or some sort of state statement against the neighbors
on a sign at their house, that may maybe that
may run a foul of the h A covenants.

Speaker 16 (01:43:41):
Well, let's assume there is no h O way. It's
just the regular municipal neighborhood. And this guy is not
making a political statement. He is making statements that are
that seem to be intentionally aimed at derailing his neighbor's
home sale.

Speaker 5 (01:43:55):
I don't think that's that's the First Amendment. I'm not
sure you can do much do much about that. And
that's not much different different in my book than neighbors
calling names to each other, not with a sign, but
just in words. And you know, the courts presume that
people have thick skin. If there wasn't that presumption, the
courts would be over full, overfilled with cases of just

(01:44:17):
garden variety neighbor neighbor arguments. So I just don't think
there's some I don't think the courts of the place.

Speaker 3 (01:44:23):
To address that situation. Hang on, Hey, we're going to
go to the lines real quick, and just right before
the break here, Lisa, you've got a question about it
in HOA. What's going on with your case?

Speaker 13 (01:44:35):
Hi, good afternoon, Thank you for having this. The h
o A in our community is redoing the covenants, and
I don't think that's actually correct because you're supposed to
have a quorum to do it. But besides that, they
are changing it. From before you only had to make

(01:44:57):
sure that your front yard was a an acceptable condition.
Now they're saying the backyards must they have a whole
bunch of rules about the backyards. Well what about those
of us that have lived here for thirty years and
we have sheds and different things that may not go
with the new covenants.

Speaker 3 (01:45:17):
Okay, so that great question. Have they already changed the
rules or is this something that's being proposed right now?

Speaker 13 (01:45:26):
It's being proposed, but none of us there's no date
on when we're voting.

Speaker 3 (01:45:31):
Is there is there a group of people that are
proposing this? I mean, who's trying to push this through
against the will of the rest of the people.

Speaker 13 (01:45:40):
Well, we don't know who's against it, who's far it
because most of us haven't talked to each other, but
they just sign it on the emails. BOD I think
it stands for board of directors.

Speaker 3 (01:45:50):
Okay, is your hoa run by a management company or
is it just run by some residents?

Speaker 13 (01:45:57):
It's run by some residents, but they have high the
lawyer to do the new covenants. But nobody voted on
that either.

Speaker 3 (01:46:07):
Interesting, where is it your property in Colorado? Or where
are you calling from?

Speaker 21 (01:46:12):
Oh?

Speaker 13 (01:46:12):
Yeah, it's in the metro area.

Speaker 3 (01:46:16):
Is this acreage or is this a subdivision? What kind
of property is it?

Speaker 13 (01:46:21):
It's most homes are between a half an acre and
an acre. Okay, I'd say most of them are half acres,
but there's some that are larger.

Speaker 3 (01:46:30):
Okay, are there some properties in there that are real
problems as far as keeping their yards up and stuff?

Speaker 13 (01:46:38):
There's one on the outskirts of it, Okay, not on
the actual inside. Other than that, there's some businesses like
landscaping businesses, and they have all their equipment and stuff
behind the fences.

Speaker 3 (01:46:51):
Yeah, all right, Lisa, hang on a second. I've got
a couple of ideas for you. We got a heartbreak
right now. We're going to go to but I'll be
right back with some ideas for you. Okay, okay, go.

Speaker 9 (01:47:01):
With a sure thing Denver's Best roofer Excel Roofing dot com.

Speaker 14 (01:47:05):
You don't pay a cent until you're content.

Speaker 9 (01:47:11):
Time for an insurance check up free, no obligation comparison
call Compass Insurance. Pay too much your coverage at dozens
of insurance companies find out now three oh three seven
seven to one help. You'll think you're his only customer
when you choose Frank durand the real estate Man dot
com to list your home with Remax Alliance three oh
three nine two zero sixteen twenty two.

Speaker 3 (01:47:32):
YEA, ripped.

Speaker 9 (01:47:39):
You needed?

Speaker 3 (01:47:41):
That's who You.

Speaker 13 (01:47:41):
Don't have to.

Speaker 1 (01:47:44):
Run anxious as fast as we can show Shooter's gonna
help come.

Speaker 3 (01:47:51):
This is the Troubleshooter Show. Now, Tom Martino, Hey, good afternoon.
John Fuller here sitting in for Tom Martino and Mark
Majors on the Troubleshooter Network. We are here to help
you solve problems, take complaints and work out your issues,
whether you've been scammed, taken advantage of cheated, lied to

(01:48:12):
whatever we can do to help out. Give us a call.
The number in the studio is three three seven one,
three eight two five five. Give us a call. We
are here to help you. We've got a couple callers
on the line that we're going to try to answer
questions for. The first has been hanging on for a while.
It's Ernie, and I just want to let Ernie know.

(01:48:33):
Bring Ernie back up on the line. Police, Ernie, you're right.
There is a deduction for blindness. It just requires that
you are legally blind as of the last day of
the tax year, and you actually have the ability to
deduct up to two thousand dollars for twenty twenty five
if you file as a single. Are you single or

(01:48:55):
filing married? Yes, I'm saying you're single, two thousand dollars
deduction for twenty five in twenty twenty four. If you're
if you're talking about last year's taxes. That deduction was
nineteen hundred and fifty dollars, so you're right, there is
a deduction. Make sure that you get that claimed on

(01:49:17):
your tax forms and stuff. If you want to go
online and just do a little bit of research and stuff,
there's quite a bit of information about the actual forms
that you have to use. You can't use every you know,
every tax form to take that credit, but it's otherwise
not too hard to do. You just need to have

(01:49:38):
a letter from your doctor proving that you're legally blind,
and you want to hang on to that for your
records in case it's ever questioned by the irs. So thanks,
sod all right, appreciate it, Ernie. Good luck with your
tax issue. Okay, thanks for calling. Uh, Lisa, we're going
to go back to you now. Lisa called and she's
got an HOA issue where her HOA here in Denver

(01:49:59):
is is seeking to change the rules to allow the
HOA to oversee the condition of not only the front yards,
but the backyards and her subdivision as well. And Lisa
is claiming that there's just virtually no idea of who's
behind this, what they're doing. Everything is met with just
cryptic emails from the Board of Directors, and now she's

(01:50:23):
under the impression that they've actually hired a law firm
to assist them in this, and so I thought it
would be wonderful for us to get on an expert.
So we have Stan, the HOA man on the line.

Speaker 6 (01:50:36):
Here.

Speaker 3 (01:50:37):
Stan, take it away, my friend.

Speaker 10 (01:50:41):
Yes, I.

Speaker 22 (01:50:43):
Care about this all the time where HOA boards violate
their authority. On this one, it's going to be probably
easy to investigate her for her proceed but more difficult
to get it enforced in her governing documents. It most

(01:51:07):
likely states who does what Now. The HOA can let
contracts to different companies as long as they're not in
conflict with either. They're governing documents, which are the declaration in.

Speaker 2 (01:51:25):
This case.

Speaker 22 (01:51:28):
Or state law, and that's called kyowa, and that's that's online.
If she just puts in cciowa and wants to explore
it there, that's fine. But I don't think she'll find
much in there other than when you change the declaration
for whatever reason, it has to pass with a vote

(01:51:50):
of the homeowners. That's one thing the board cannot act
independently on.

Speaker 3 (01:51:57):
So before the break, you're trying to stand sorry to
interrupt you. Lisa was saying, there actually appear to be
meeting without a quorum. How much stuff can they do
under the cover of darkness, and how much stuff requires
them to have an open board meeting for the members
and to have a quorum before they go making any
substance of changes.

Speaker 22 (01:52:15):
Well, if they make changes, if you have the financial
means to fight them in court, and you shouldn't have
to go to court over these things, then I think
I haven't read her declaration, but she can show anything
in there about who's supposed to do what and all
that on contracting and all that. Generally they don't get

(01:52:37):
into too much on contracts who does what, because if
the board has the authority do a lot of that,
even negotiate new contracts. But it's in there, then she
has a good case. However, here's the problem again. Probably
I always say ninety nine of HOA homeowner issues could

(01:53:02):
be resolved if we had an enforcement venue other than court,
which is costly expensive, complicated even the most simple case.
And there have been several bills over the last couple
of years. In this past session there was a real
good bill, but right now we have no venue. The

(01:53:24):
state can't intervene. We have a state hoa office that
is powerless, it's an administrative body. And other than that,
if she can prove they violated the declaration, then and
she can afford to go to court. That's a gamble
because even small claims court, you're risking thousands of dollars.

Speaker 2 (01:53:48):
If you lose, you will be.

Speaker 22 (01:53:50):
Paying the defendant. In other words, the ways so legal
caught right.

Speaker 3 (01:53:57):
So San, what do you say to somebody that's, you know,
just a homeowner that's just trying to get some information
and to have an open and and fair election. I
hate those words, you know, before they go and and
make make major changes. Like Lisa was telling us before
the break that you know, some of these homeowners have
been there for thirty years plus with their backyards and stuff,

(01:54:20):
and you know, don't want to have a new set
of rules coming down about what you know, what they
can and cannot do with their property. So what steps
would you tell Lisa that she needs to take, specifically
to let this board know that she's she's looking at
them and she's take you know, taking note of what's
going on and preserving all the rights that she has

(01:54:40):
to eventually pursue it. If she chose to do.

Speaker 22 (01:54:42):
That, right, first she should read the declaration or the
governing documents, and that includes the bylaws in case substance
in there. If she finds anything specific about what the
h OA is allowed to spend the monthly does or fees,

(01:55:04):
whatever you want to call them, and now they're going
to be what I mean, specifically like those services. If
it's in general, where the HOA governing documents says the
HOA is responsible for homin area grass and other areas, well,
that's that's general. That says you can do it any

(01:55:25):
way you want. You can accomplish that feet. But if
it says those services will be contracted for and however
they're done now if I miss what you said on
who's doing it now? But if they want to switch
companies at any time, they.

Speaker 3 (01:55:42):
Can, well, I don't think it's so much a matter
of them switching companies as changing the rules about what
people can do with their property. And that's really okay
the concern that the power has of course, yeah, depending on.

Speaker 13 (01:55:59):
It's an h o it's not an h o A,
it's a pl A property owners association. And to this
date they always pretty much did people volunteered and did
things for beautification and landscaping. This is a big change.

(01:56:20):
And uh, okay, I don't know how they got the
permission to hire.

Speaker 14 (01:56:24):
A lawyer to do this.

Speaker 22 (01:56:26):
They to do that, Okay, well they can now let
me let me reflect back to one thing. They can
ask rules changes as long as they don't conflict with
the declaration and all the covenants that you were told
you had to abide by when you moved in. If this,

(01:56:47):
if it says in the in the covenants you can't
paint anyhow in here other than white, and you go
ahead and paint it fluorescent orange without approval, well then
you're invite. If they want to add fluorescent orange and
it doesn't conflict with your declaration, which is going to

(01:57:08):
rule this case, then they can do Yeah. They can
make different rules. Yeah they can. They can't change the declaration, however,
so you need to thoroughly read that.

Speaker 2 (01:57:20):
That's what's going to rule.

Speaker 22 (01:57:21):
And if you're wondering, okay, now, what what do I
do again?

Speaker 8 (01:57:26):
There is no out.

Speaker 22 (01:57:29):
There is no venue for homeowners two complete disputes, our
dispute resolution none, not the HOA office in the state,
just none.

Speaker 8 (01:57:40):
Except court.

Speaker 22 (01:57:41):
Court can be costly. It's a gamble, there's no you know,
you don't know what the outcome is going to be.
You can go to small claims court to reduce the cost,
and in small claims court you could ask the court
for an injunction against doing this. I can prove they're
violating our current governing documents, and yes, you can get

(01:58:05):
an injunction.

Speaker 13 (01:58:06):
That would be the cheapest.

Speaker 22 (01:58:07):
If you've got a lawyer, that would be most likely
being reimbursed and they would pay their own legal costs.
But if you lose, be prepared, on just about any
case that came across our desk recently, you're going to
pay four to six thousand in their legal costs if
you lose.

Speaker 13 (01:58:25):
So I always put caught.

Speaker 22 (01:58:27):
Up the word of caution. I can name case after
case that is lost in court when the HOA violated
the covenants. And here's another thing, and shut up a second,
because it goes on and on.

Speaker 13 (01:58:44):
The court.

Speaker 22 (01:58:47):
Can declare something on the order, either call it judicial
discretion or just say well, in the governing documents, they're
allowed to use their own discretion that's making decisions, unless
they don't. Unless they don't violate. They can do that
unless they don't violate the declaration, right, So look at

(01:59:10):
your declaration.

Speaker 3 (01:59:12):
Yeah, definitely, Lisa, start with the declarations. That's going to
be your starting point for anything. And then I would
follow up with some serious documentation of your concerns and
questions to the board and pepper them with certified letters
if you need to show them that you mean business
and stuff, and kind of go from there. Stan Rinsovich,
the HOA guy, Stan, I really appreciate your help today.

(01:59:32):
Thanks for that information, Lisa. I wish we had better
news for you, but it sounds like you're one of
a million HOA callers where basically the HOA has an
incredible amount of power and very little of it flows
through to the homeowner. So thank you very much for
the call. We've got to run to a break right now, David.
We'll be right back with you in just a moment.

Speaker 9 (01:59:56):
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dot com. You don't pay a cent until you're content.
Time for an insurance check up, free no obligation comparison
call Compass insurance paying too much your coverage at dozens
of insurance companies find out now three all three seven
to seven to one help. You'll think you're his only

(02:00:17):
customer when you choose Frank durand the real estate Man
dot com to list your home with Remax Alliance three
oh three nine two zero sixteen twenty two.

Speaker 3 (02:00:33):
Hey, good afternoon, John Fuller, back on the Troubleshooter Network
on this Monday afternoon. Uh, thank you for listening. We're
here to help you. So we need you to pick
up the phone and give us a call at three
O three seven one three eight two five five. That
is the number to get our expert assistance and all
things scam troubles issues that we can help you with.

(02:00:54):
So give us a call. I'm going to go right
to the caller line. Here, we've got David on the line. David,
what's going on today?

Speaker 8 (02:01:03):
Oh?

Speaker 6 (02:01:03):
I just want to.

Speaker 19 (02:01:05):
It's unbelievable.

Speaker 18 (02:01:06):
It's great to hear your voice. You're doing a turnfic job.

Speaker 3 (02:01:09):
Well, thank you.

Speaker 6 (02:01:11):
I'm just part of the.

Speaker 18 (02:01:14):
Not like Mark Maker so much job and I that's
complete ethotism in my opinion, it's going to ruin the empire.
You are doing a great job. Let's get you back.
Let's get Mark maker out of the seat, make him
a deputy, send him off.

Speaker 8 (02:01:30):
In or wherever.

Speaker 18 (02:01:31):
And that's all I got to say, Mark, John Butler, Yes, Mark, No,
Brad O'Brien yes, Mark No, all right, I don't know,
it's just my opinion. Anyway, have a great day.

Speaker 3 (02:01:44):
Hey, thanks, thanks for the call. Appreciated, David, uh Dragon,
you want to cut that one out and save that
little femail it to Mark right now exactly. He needs
to see that right away. It's very important. So yeah, well,
thank you. We appreciate that. Thanks for calling in with
those comments. I don't even come close to measuring up

(02:02:07):
to the job at Tom and Mark do here, so
I appreciate them having me in on there much deserved
day off. So give us a call if we can
help you. We have open lines right now. Deputy Dmitri
had a couple more calls and are a couple more questions,
so we wanted to go to those and what's going
on mister Dimitri.

Speaker 16 (02:02:26):
John, you know, since you're a big time personal injury
attorney and the only one I know, maybe you can
answer this I've often wondered. So you know, personal injury,
as you know, is just a huge industry. And I've
often wondered, what is the difference in the in terms
of results to the client, between a shop like yours,
where I believe you advertise that you give people your

(02:02:48):
cell number and you obviously people have really great personal
attention from you, and the giant settlement mills that I
see advertised on subways and trains and buses.

Speaker 3 (02:03:00):
And I have nothing against them.

Speaker 16 (02:03:01):
I've never used their services, but it seems like those
are and I've heard the term settlement mills over and
over again, and I'm just wondering, if the client's insurance
company gets a letter from them, knowing that that's the
firm that probably doesn't go to trial very often, and
gets a letter from you, knowing that you do, what's

(02:03:21):
the actual It's hard to you know, it's it's I know,
it's not easy to say what the average case is,
because there's probably no such thing as an average case,
But from the perspective of a client and the result measured,
and just the size of the check and how quickly
they get the check and how quickly their medical bills
get settled, what is the difference between a firm vice

(02:03:42):
yours and the ginormous one that advertises on billboards.

Speaker 3 (02:03:49):
Well, that's a multipart question. I'll give you kind of
my two cent on it. You know, number one, insurance
companies have always been the master of information. If you
want to know how many trees have fallen on a
particular street, and you know, in every windstorm with when
in excess of twenty miles an hour coming out of
the northwest quadrant, they probably can pull that data up

(02:04:11):
on some computer and tell you exactly what that is.
So make no mistake about it. They track me and
people like me all the time. They know every single
case I've ever had, the injuries, the timeline, the result,
the recovery. They know whether we filed litigation, gone to trial,

(02:04:32):
whether we've gone to mediation. I mean they know everything
about everything, okay, And so reputation does matter. It is important,
but in many respects, you know, it comes down to service.
It comes down to what you want out of the
representative that you hire to handle your case. And so

(02:04:54):
where I think we really shine is that as a
small office, we know our clients and so I know
who they are. My staff knows who they are. When
you call into my office, we all kind of know.

Speaker 8 (02:05:04):
Who you are.

Speaker 3 (02:05:06):
That's something that only a smaller firm can deliver, and
and to me that's important. I want to do business
with people that know who I am when I walk
in the door, and I think my clients are the
same way. The downfall of, you know, a super large
insurance company is that you're never going to have that
level of recognition of you and your case with with

(02:05:30):
any but just a few people in that firm. You
heard the gentleman that called in earlier about another large
firm in town that had a you know, a litigation matter,
had had a great experience and then had another accident
and had a less great experience when an attorney left
the firm, and he felt like he was left high
and dry and didn't get consulted in it, didn't get

(02:05:50):
asked what his you know, his desires were, and now
feels like he's being held hostage by that large firm
that is as sort of a lean on his case.
And so I mean not that that's going to happen
every time with a large firm, but but certainly the turnover,
you know, is something that comes up a lot, and
the clients don't get consulted. Make no mistake, I have

(02:06:11):
turnover at my firm, not among the attorneys, because I'm
the only attorney in my firm. So if I turn over,
we have bigger issues, but we have turnover, and it happens.
But but it's still me driving the boat, and it's
still me that that is handling the case, and I'm
the one that's making the strategic decisions and providing the
guidance as to the level of service I want to

(02:06:32):
provide to my clients. So that's that's really where I
think we excel as a small firm soul you would
you feel the same way. There's big real estate firms
and small guys as well.

Speaker 17 (02:06:42):
Well.

Speaker 5 (02:06:43):
I'm a solo practitioner, so the client speaks with me
from the from the very beginning until the very end,
right and no assistance, no secretaries, h So you know.

Speaker 3 (02:06:53):
I think that's critically important. The people that hire Brad
hire Brad, nobody else. It's not you know the name,
but they've got a junior associate doing the work and stuff.
That's just the commitment that I've made to my client
and the job that I want to do for my client.
That's if that answers the question.

Speaker 16 (02:07:11):
John, Well, you know there was another part of my question.
And I'm not sure if we're brushing up against some
ethical boundary in your industry. And forgive me, because I
if I am coming up against that. But I'm wondering,
not specifically about your firm, but you know, the small,
high quality customer service firm like yours in the ginormous one,
what's the average difference in the checks that their clients receive.

Speaker 3 (02:07:33):
Yeah, I don't really know. I mean I would have
no way to know that it's impossible to take two cases.
First off, there's no two identical cases exactly. I mean,
there just can't be. There's some aspect of the client
or the liability equation or the insurance equation, or the
coverage or the deductibles or the health insurance or the

(02:07:56):
medpay or the treatment or the ambulance driver. I mean,
there's variables that you can never get the identical two cases. Agree.
I used to say, with training paralegals and stuff, that
it takes five years before you've actually seen almost everything
there is to see in all the variables in personal
injury cases. And I truly believe that. So so, after

(02:08:20):
having done it for more than twenty years, I'm on
my fifth turn of seeing everything once over again, maybe,
and I still get surprised with stuff that I don't know,
So that's an impossible question to answer. I still think
it comes down to the better your advocate, your attorney
knows you and your case and the unique impact that

(02:08:40):
that case has had on you, the better that attorney
can convey that information to the insurance company, and in theory,
the greater the value is going to be because of that.
So that's that's all I can really do for you. There.
We got to take another quick break here. We'll be
right back after this message.

Speaker 9 (02:09:04):
Go with a sure thing Denver's Best roofer Excel Roofing
dot com. You don't pay a cent until you're content.
Time for an insurance checkup free no obligation comparison call
Compass Insurance paying too much your coverage at dozens of
insurance companies find out now three all three seven seven
to one help. You'll think you're his only customer when

(02:09:26):
you choose Frank durand the real estate Man dot com
to list your home with Remax Alliance three all three
nine two zero sixteen twenty two.

Speaker 3 (02:09:45):
Hey, good afternoon, John Fuller here at tom Martino Troubleshooter Network.
We are getting close to wrapping things up here. We've
got room for a couple more calls here. Give us
a shout at three oh three seven one three eight
two five five if we can help you. We've got
a couple of callers on the line here. Katie, you
have a comment about hoarding. What's going on, Katie?

Speaker 18 (02:10:07):
Hi?

Speaker 10 (02:10:07):
John. I caught some of the dialogue a while ago
about living near a hoarder and property values, et cetera.
I own a home in Denver, Denver County, and it's
not as cut and dried as was described. It was

(02:10:28):
a very bad situation with a hoarder across the street
from my home. So when they tried to sell the
house next door, the realtor ended up not marketing it
with a sign, so because when they did, the hoarder
went over there and would throw beer cans and talked
to the prospective buyers and pretty much screw the deal.

(02:10:51):
So even calling the police when the hoarder guy tried
to run me over in my front yard, they just said,
it's not a crime to be mentally ill. What So
basically he died. Wait a second, long story, short too late.
He died in August, and luckily his brother found the

(02:11:15):
body the very next day. But it's impossible to get
rid of a hoarder or to have the inspector would come.
They were finding him five hundred a month and then
nine hundred a month, and nothing was going to make
the problem end. Wow, Denver and Denver County.

Speaker 3 (02:11:40):
Right, that's crazy, brad Any thoughts on that? I mean,
is it just gets so bad sometimes that there's nothing
you can do about a order.

Speaker 5 (02:11:48):
Yeah, some really bad real estate disputes between neighbors only
get resolved when somebody either moves away or frankly dies.

Speaker 13 (02:11:55):
Well.

Speaker 10 (02:11:55):
Yeah, and he also owned a second house miles away,
and we're in a very high dollar neighborhood in Denver,
so he was kind of stinking up the block, if
you know what I mean. And the second house just sold,
you know, as is since he's gone, just to kind
of unload it.

Speaker 3 (02:12:17):
Katie, do you think this really was just a mental
health issue or was there something?

Speaker 10 (02:12:21):
Yeah, I'm convinced it's a mental illness.

Speaker 17 (02:12:24):
Right.

Speaker 10 (02:12:25):
And my father died and we had the hearse in
front of my house, and we had this guy sitting
in his front yard throwing beer cans at the hearse,
do you know what I mean? It's mental illness and
plus alcoholism. And he then collapsed at one of his

(02:12:46):
homes because of the filth and was outside and no
one found him till the next day on the ground.
And it happened to be a June day a few
years ago where we were having a very very cold
overnight June Day, and it was tragic, and a little
girl found him, and then because the way he looked

(02:13:07):
and acted, they took him to Denver Health. And all
of his properties are worth over a million dollars, but
they're just they're screwed up, you know what I mean.
They're The third one that's left is Englewood, and I
don't know that much about it, but it's on five lots,
so he would just move the crap back and forth
from one house to another. And it is it's mental illness,

(02:13:32):
and it's it's very sad, you know.

Speaker 3 (02:13:37):
Yeah, it sounds terrible to have to deal with.

Speaker 16 (02:13:40):
And John, look at the extent to which the costs
of this mental illness are externalized. Look how many neighbors,
how many people have to pay the price for it, right,
it's not the guy's fault that he went nuts, but
it's certainly not his neighbor's fault, nor is it their
responsibility to put up with the externalized costs of this.

Speaker 10 (02:14:00):
And I have a lot of pride of home ownership.
I'm going to say my house is when ice is
on the block, and there are any nice many nice ones.
But when I would have a worker come, I said,
do not engage with the man across the street. Well,
for sure, I wanted to ask the questions. And I mean,
I'm sixty six, I'm a young sixty six, and he

(02:14:21):
would just pass me out and call me a grandma stripper.
And I finally said, you know, I would be a
damn good grandma stripper.

Speaker 3 (02:14:28):
Are you out there stripping in the front yard, Katie?

Speaker 11 (02:14:30):
Come on?

Speaker 8 (02:14:32):
You know.

Speaker 10 (02:14:33):
But when he tried to run me off the road
and would literally I realized he was following me. I
was calling the police. I have logs on my computer
in there. Just that was when the guy said, Katie,
it's not a crime to be mentally ill.

Speaker 3 (02:14:47):
Yeah, Katie, thanks for tell.

Speaker 10 (02:14:49):
Me what your name is. Because if I'm on a
forty eight hour episode, I hope they interview.

Speaker 3 (02:14:54):
You Katie, thanks for sharing your story. We appreciate it.
We'll talk to you and soon we're going to take
a real quick break here. When we get back. Logan,
you've got an issue with service We're going to take
care of. We'll be right away back. Good afternoon, John

(02:15:23):
Fuller here, getting back to the Troubleshore Network. We are
getting close to wrapping things up here, but we have
a couple of calls here lined up. Logan, we are
going to take your call next. Logan, what is going
on with you today?

Speaker 12 (02:15:38):
Well, kind of wanted to share my experience and see
if maybe you guys could point me in the right direction. Okay,
I bought a new Chevy Diesel Tahoe from Automation Chevy
North in the end of twenty one. Had several recalls
and things with a new vehicle across the ears, but

(02:16:01):
ninety seven days ago I took it in for some
pretty major problems and I have not seen that vehicle since.
What fighting with AutoNation, their service department, their general manager, Chevy,
GM financial, everybody. They still have not fixed it.

Speaker 19 (02:16:21):
They don't know what's.

Speaker 8 (02:16:22):
Wrong with it.

Speaker 12 (02:16:23):
It's an escalated engineering case. But I can't get anybody
to even return my phone calls at this point in general,
I've requested.

Speaker 3 (02:16:33):
Yeah, logan, what is wrong with it? What prompted you
to take it into again with.

Speaker 12 (02:16:38):
Well, it blew the pan seal for the oil pan,
which I then had to spend a month fighting that
it was covered under warranty. I also bought the GM
Super Duper warranty from the dealership when I bought this vehicle.
So yeah, between those two entity who apparently don't talk

(02:17:01):
to each other, the dealership didn't want to cover it
under the powertrain warranty because somehow the oil pangasket is
not part of the powertrain, so they tried to push
it back on the extended warranty that I had purchased.
That took a month to resolve while they sit there
and don't order parts. They got that fixed, then it

(02:17:23):
was a wiring issue. Then while it was in there,
three more recalls came in. The wiring issue was not resolved,
even though forty days in they called me to come
pick up the vehicle because it was ready. When I arrived,
it was dead. They finally jumped it, got it started
started exact same problem. The dash instrument cluster doesn't work,

(02:17:49):
displaying error messages saying that the SIMS disabled speed the
autobraking was part of the recall that didn't work.

Speaker 16 (02:18:00):
Looking so look and hang on a second. Sounds like
there's a combination of both recalls and actual flaws within
your truck that are unrelated to the to the recalls.

Speaker 3 (02:18:10):
Is that correct?

Speaker 12 (02:18:12):
I think that's probably accurate. But being that nobody from
the dealership has talked to me in almost forty five days,
despite multiple messages and stop buys, I really don't know.

Speaker 16 (02:18:23):
So are there's still how many problems are still unresolved
with your truck?

Speaker 12 (02:18:30):
My understanding is that they're replacing or have ordered and
it is backlogged or back ordered a seventh wiring harness.

Speaker 19 (02:18:39):
For the vehicle.

Speaker 12 (02:18:42):
Well really, and I requested a buy back assistance like
forty days ago at this point, So.

Speaker 3 (02:18:51):
This is a twenty one yeah, twenty one okay, and
they're on their seventh wiring harness for the entire vehicle.

Speaker 12 (02:19:02):
I don't know that they are all the entire wiring
harness or like the cluster wiring harness. Again, not getting
a lot of details from them, but it is the
seventh instance that they have reported that they are waiting
on a wiring harness.

Speaker 16 (02:19:15):
Again, Well, what did you mean by by a buy back?
I mean it sounds like you're way past the Lemon
law buyback period. Is there some other buyback that you're
trying to accomplish.

Speaker 12 (02:19:25):
Well, that's that's what I'm trying to initiate through GM,
who said that they have initiated it. You can't ever
talk to anybody on the GM escalation side either. I
have a case number, a case manager, and over forty
days ago they said they started that buyback process.

Speaker 16 (02:19:43):
Wait, GM's told you they started a process to buy
back your.

Speaker 19 (02:19:46):
Truck YEP like two days ago.

Speaker 16 (02:19:51):
Well, you know, we do have a great lemon law
attorney John I forgot her name now, but Rina, it
may be great to get her on tomorrow and kind
of weigh in on this topic.

Speaker 3 (02:20:02):
I think that's really smart to do. I mean, it's
it's such a niche practice to be an attorney that
specializes in lemon law. But she is great and she
is super knowledgeable. Would it be okay if we took
down your information logan and gave you a call on
tomorrow's show as soon as we can get rain on
the line to kind of help through these issues.

Speaker 12 (02:20:24):
Yeah, that'd be wonderful.

Speaker 3 (02:20:25):
Yeah, let's do that. I think that'd be better than
us just kind of guessing. You know, what's going on here.
It sounds like a mess. And you know, my initial
reaction would be, there's no way we're going to get
a buyback initiated on a four year old vehicle. But
but if GM is doing that, there may be bigger
issues going on with your vehicle and stuff that not
even you have really been made aware of yet. And

(02:20:46):
so so I think it's important that we get somebody
that can look at all the different databases that are
out there and and see what's really going on with
that vehicle. So hang on, Logan, we're gonna we're gonna
take down your information and we'll try to get the
attorney Rain lined up and get you on the line
with her to see if we can't get you some help. Okay,

(02:21:06):
I appreciate the call, Logan. So did you have any
additional questions there? Dmitri for you or Brad. Either way,
we're trying to wrap up all your textbook of questions
that you bring in every day. You know, we miss
any subparts there, you know, let's play a new game.

Speaker 16 (02:21:24):
It's called Do I have a case?

Speaker 3 (02:21:27):
No, you don't have a case, Dmitri. The answer to
all Dmitri's questions are no. That federal statute that you
looked up, it does not envision you or any case
that you could dream, or any subparts of any case
that you could dream. So the answer is no. Hey, listen,
Thanks to everybody for a great show today. Save all
your problems for us. I appreciate the confidence of being

(02:21:48):
in the studio, and we'll talk to you soon. Care