(WSVN) - Termites are eating up a South Florida townhouse. The homeowner says he needs to tent the place to exterminate the pests, but he can’t. That’s why a call came in to Help Me Howard with Patrick Fraser.
Phyllis and Stanley got married. After 30 years, they got divorced. And today they know which era is better.
Phyllis Jacobs: “Divorced. We are much better friends.”
Friends who still hug and help each other, which is why Phyllis was at Stanley’s townhouse.
Phyllis Jacobs: “Everybody has termites.”
Termite wings and droppings are all over the home. Normally, you’d tent to kill them, but Stanley can’t since he lives in a townhouse.
Phyllis Jacobs: “Four of us have agreed to be tented, but our next-door neighbor does not agreed to be tented.”
The five houses are connected. You can’t tent just one, and spot treatments haven’t worked either.
Phyllis Jacobs: “Right, everybody’s sprayed, and every time you spray it’s really expensive, and they tell you that it doesn’t help, that you have to tent.”
The cost to tent would be around $850 per unit owner. Stanley offered to pay the bill for the neighbor who won’t tent. She said no.
Phyllis Jacobs: “We’re offering to pay for this. What is – what is the reason? And she never gave me one.”
Stunning to Stanley, as he constantly has to clean up termite droppings.
Stanley Jacobs: “The termite eats the furring strips up in the attic, and then the drywall falls. It comes loose and falls.”
There is no association here. No property manager. So the residents have to work things out with each other.
Phyllis Jacobs: “All the houses are going to get destroyed. I don’t understand why this lady doesn’t want to tent. Her house is being destroyed.”
Stanley owns the house, but feels like he doesn’t control it.
Phyllis Jacobs: “And everybody needs to know that when you’re living in connected houses like this, your neighbors control what you can do.”
Or do they, Howard?
Howard Finkelstein: “When there is no law on the books to force a holdout to tent, the law allows you to seek injunctive relief. In other words, sue in county court to force the owner to allow the tenting and pay their share of the extermination bill. And in many cases, the judge will force the person refusing to tent to pay the legal fees for the people who sued to get the tenting done.”
In our interview, Phyllis said she would pay for the neighbor’s extermination bill to help Stanley. I contacted the woman who doesn’t want to tent.
She said she didn’t have termites and was tired of Stanley and other neighbors harassing her about it. Then she told me, if Phyllis would pay for her share of the tenting, she would allow it. Then she and Stanley started battling over a code violation on their shared wall, and the deal fell apart.
Meaning Stanley may have to go to court.
Stanley Jacobs: “If the only process is to sue her to get this tenting done, than I am going to do whatever I have to do to do that.”
Stanley expects to win in court, but never thought he would be held hostage as termites chew through his house.
Stanley Jacobs: “It’s been a nightmare. Almost two years I have been dealing with this, Patrick.”
We will follow Stanley in court, unless the holdout agrees to allow the tenting when she realizes she will probably face big legal fees when the neighbors win in court.
And Stanley wants the county or state to change the law so other people don’t go through what he is going through, which the government may be able to do. We will see.
Problems swarming around you? Tired of being bugged? Let us wing it to exterminate the pest for you.
With this Help Me Howard, I’m Patrick Fraser, 7News.
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