“World's Most Complete Neighborpedia”
Explore:   What's happening in your neck of the woods?

Farmington Hills, MI

Blatant Race and Sex Discrimination at Federally-Subsidized Apartment Complex

11-13-09
Jason Rose
Jason Rose: Real Estate - Other in Farmington Hills, MI

Michigan real estate continuing educationHere is another example of a recent Fair Housing Act lawsuit brought by the United States Department of Justice (“DOJ”). I try to post case summaries in order to provide timely updates to real estate professionals about the "dos and don'ts" under the Fair Housing Act, since fair housing is such an important issue.

Yesterday (November 12, 2009), the DOJ filed a lawsuit in federal court alleging a pattern or practice of violations of the Fair Housing Act by the owner and managers of Forum Manor Apartments, a federally-subsidized apartment complex, for refusing to rent to African-Americans and males, refusing to allow tenants to have African-American visitors, sexually harassing female tenants and retaliating against tenants who complained about such discrimination.

The lawsuit alleges that Roger Harris, the manager of Forum Manor Apartments, refused to rent to African-Americans. According to the court documents, Mr. Harris told a prospective tenant, "I don't rent to people who look like you," or words to that effect. The lawsuit further alleges that Mr. Harris repeatedly sexually harassed and intimidated female tenants and refused to rent to males.

An investigation conducted by United States Department of Housing and Urban Development (“HUD”) prior to the lawsuit being filed determined that Mr. Harris routinely and blatantly made disparaging, insulting, and derogatory comments to numerous tenants, including those with biracial children and African-American boyfriends, about African-Americans calling them the N-word, thugs, hoodlums, and gangsters. He warned tenants that African-American cause trouble and live off their girlfriends, and he did not want them on the property or stirring up trouble. Additionally, HUD determined that prior to its investigation, Mr. Harris never approved a single African-American applicant at Forum Manor Apartments.

HUD also determined that Mr. Harris intimidated, threatened, and scared numerous female tenants with his unpredictable and controlling behavior. He did so by peeping in their windows at night, making them cry, yelling aggressively and angrily at them, threatening to terminate their housing, telling them they could not have male guests and he was the only man they needed, and attempting to exert power over them by insisting he was doing them favors by allowing them to live there or by not evicting them.

Additionally, HUD determined that Mr. Harris routinely created an uncomfortable living environment for many of the women by making inappropriate and vulgar comments, gestures, and innuendos of a sexually suggestive nature, and by frequently touching them in a personal way, such as rubbing their backs or shoulders or touching their hair or caressing their faces. Mr. Harris also made sexual comments and innuendos implying he would provide favorable treatment to female tenants if they engaged in sex acts with him.

Moreover, HUD determined that, at no time prior to its investigation, did Mr. Harris rent a unit to any single male head of household. Mr. Harris regularly told tenants that the property was for single women to get back on their feet and made other statements indicating he preferred to rent to women.

The lawsuit also names as defendants Hediger Enterprises Inc., Forum Manor Associates L.P., and Forum Manor LLC, which jointly own and manage Forum Manor. Those entities were on notice of Mr. Harris' mistreatment of tenants at the property and knew or should have known of his discriminatory conduct. The lawsuit alleges that they are vicariously liable for Mr. Harris’ conduct.

This lawsuit arose as a result of complaints filed with HUD by four tenants. After an investigation of the complaints, HUD issued a charge of discrimination and, after complainants elected to have the case heard in federal court, referred the case to DOJ, which filed this lawsuit.

The lawsuit seeks a court order prohibiting future discrimination by the defendants, monetary damages for those harmed by the defendants’ actions and a civil penalty. The complaint is an allegation of unlawful conduct. The allegations must still be proven in court.

As every real estate professional should already know, the Fair Housing Act prohibits discrimination in housing based on race, sex, color, national origin, disability, religion and familial status. Illegal acts include harassing tenants based on race, color and/or sex and discriminating against tenants because they associate with persons of another race. It is also unlawful to intimidate any person because the person has filed a fair housing complaint or participated in a fair housing investigation.

Source: U.S. Department of Justice press release, HUD Charge of Discrimination, and legal complaint (portions of press release used with permission)

-----------------------------------------------

To learn more about fair housing issues (along with a variety of other real estate topics), please visit us at www.123ConEd.com. We are the leading online provider of Michigan real estate continuing education. All of our courses are fully approved and properly certified by the State of Michigan, and are offered online.

Copyright © 123 ConEd LLC 2009. All rights reserved.

Is it time to downsize your Metro Detroit home?

Russ Ravary - Michigan Homes for sale -  Michigan Real estate & Mortgage info: Real Estate Agent in Northville, MI

Lately it has been hard to downsize your Metro Detroit home because selling your Metro Detroit home would have lost you a lot of money. Most Metro Detroit homes have lost 30 to 50% of their value. So if a Metro Detroit home buyer sold their home and downsized their home they would lose money by buying a smaller home.

Let's say you own a 2400 square foot Farmington Hills home that was once worth $300,000. Now it's only worth $200,000. But now you want to downsize to a 1000 - 1200 square ft Farmington Hills condo. But you hated to lose all that money on your old Farmington Hills home.

Congress and President Obama have now given you a little gift of a $6500 tax credit if you have owned a primary residence 5 out of the last 8 years. $6500 just for moving. It's that a nice little gift. So even if you are downsizing it pays to move now.

http://www.iclipart.com

So it may be a great time to move if you are:

  • a empty nester with home way too large for you and your spouse
  • a retiree that wants to move out of state
  • a seller that wants to move closer to family
  • a widower that needs to move from the memories
  • or a homeowner that can't keep up with all the home maintenance

Your Farmington Hills home's value won't come back for years to come so now is a great time to move forward with life. So give me a call to plan your move and grab the $6500 our politicians are giving out.

Farmington Hills real estate update

Russ Ravary - Michigan Homes for sale -  Michigan Real estate & Mortgage info: Real Estate Agent in Northville, MI

Here is what is happening in the Farmington Hills real estate in the last six months. There have been 418 Farmington Hills homes that have sold in the last six months. Out of 418 Farmington Hills homes 314 of them have been under $210,000.

The average sold price for Farmington Hills homes is $162,873.00 (the last six months) and on the average they took 120 days to sell.

Price Statistics Legend
Range Name Price Range Number of Listings Days on Market
10000 to 110000 121 104
110001 to 210000 193 122
210001 to 310000 85 122
310001 to 410000 13 181
410001 to 510000 1 157
510001 to 610000 3 138
610001 to 710000 1 189
710001 to 810000 0 0
810001 to 910000 0 0
910001 to 1010000 0 0
1010001 to 1100000 1 507

For the 418 listings: For the 418 Sold listings:
Average List Price $171,254.00 Average Sold Price $162,873.00
Median List Price $164,937.50 Median Sold Price $155,500.00
Highest List Price $1,199,000.00 Highest Sold Price $1,100,000.00
Lowest List Price $2,100.00 Lowest Sold Price $12,000.00
List Volume $71,584,260.00 Sales Volume $68,081,070.00
Avg. Days On Market 120 Avg. Days On Market 121

I hope this quick Farmington Hills real estate update gave a glimpse of what is happening in Farmington Hills. Information Courtesy of Real Comp II Ltd.

Metro Detroit relocation information

Russ Ravary - Michigan Homes for sale -  Michigan Real estate & Mortgage info: Real Estate Agent in Northville, MI

Metro Detroit Relocation Information

Whether you are relocating to Metro Detroit area from out of state or just moving to Wayne or Oakland County from within Michigan you want make the right choice in the neighborhood and the right city. You want to know about the neighborhoods in the area. For example you might want to know: What about Plymouth crime statistics, Northville schools? How do they compare to Novi or South Lyon Schools? What age group are most of the residents in Livonia? Is Canton, or Redford a better place to live? What about the taxes?

On my Livonia real estate home page or on my metro Detroit real estate information website I have many cities listed, millage rates, subdivisions within the city. Scroll down the whole front home page and click on the area for valuable city info. Below are links and suggestions on how to find more information than even I have on my sites.

Metro Detroit Relocation Information is important to you the buyer. The first thing I recommend you should do is search the city. Google or Yahoo the information you want. Go to the actual cities site and the chamber of commerce and read about the community. Read about the schools, police and fire department. Then use outside sources to get through the "hype"

Metro Detroit School Information So your move to Michigan is going to take you to Redford. What about the schools, what about the test scores, How does Redford compare to Northville. Or how does Plymouth schools compare to Novi schools. Here are some ways to compare them:

www.greatschools.net http://www.schoolmatters.com/ michigan.privateschoolsreport.com www.schooldigger.com www.publicschoolreview.com www.schoolmatch.com www.ratemyteachers.com

Demographics about Metro Detroit information Are you relocating to Michigan and want to know about Canton Michigan or a city in Oakland County. You might want to know the average age, the average income, the races of the people to see if you are going to like the area or fit in. You don't want to move your 6 kids into an area that 85% of the residents are over 65.

http://www.census.gov/main/www/cen2000.html http://www.maps-n-stats.com/ http://profiles.nationalrelocation.com http://www.muninetguide.com/ http://www.epodunk.com/ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki http://michigan.hometownlocator.com

Metro Detroit crime Statistics How bad is the crime in Northville, how does it compare to your old city? How good are the Michigan crime statistics?

http://www.infoplease.com/ http://www.cityrating.com/
www.crime.org http://livonia.areaconnect.com

Best places So you are nervous about your Metro Detroit relocation and you want the best possible city. Here are a few more areas to check out. Novi Michigan may be the town for your family.

http://www.bestplaces.net/ http://www.findyourspot.com/ www.cityrating.com www.homefair.com

Local Metro Detroit suburb Data Now here are spots to get information about your Metro Detroit relocation. Whether it is Livonia, Garden City, Wayne county, Oakland county or any county in the local metro Detroit area you can learn a lot about the spot you are moving to.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki http://www.city-data.com/ http://www.relocationnow.com/ http://www.infomi.com
http://zipskinny.com/

Rashid Khan Farmington Hills MI I'm ashamed

Russ Ravary - Michigan Homes for sale -  Michigan Real estate & Mortgage info: Real Estate Agent in Northville, MI

Rashid Khan of 24136 Lori Ct Farmington Hills is one guy that I don't think much of. You see in the last few weeks my wife if having some health problems. She's a three time twenty year breast cancer survivor. She's one of those people nobody can ever say anything bad about. She's just a sweet person.

Unfortunately Rashid Khan of Farmington Hills is going to feel my wrath of this uncertainty. See he is everything my wife is not. My wife is a giver, Rashid is a taker in my opinion. My wife is a person that tells the truth, Rashid well....

You see I have taken Rashid Khan out for several months looking at homes. My wife even helped to find homes for him. She took time out of her busy day to help him and his fiancee look at homes.

But last week I got this email from Rashid.

Hi Russ,

Hope everything is well. Maria and I are deciding to stop our house search since it is getting really close to our wedding date and we are getting hectic with arranging things and we also have to fly out of town for week or two which will give us even more less time to see homes and make a decsion. Also it is getting harder to find the home and deadline being so close we didn't want to rush into anything and just concentrate on wedding first and then home. We want to thank you for all of your efforts and time for showing us the homes and giving us the wisdom on what to look for in a home. When we are back in the market to look at homes we will sure to give you a call first. Again thank you for everything. I can go ahead and have my bank cancel the check that I gave you for Earnest money.

Thank You,

Rashid

So I sent this email back to him and shredded his check immediately for him.

Rashid,
I understand completely. I was amazed that you had the time to look with the wedding coming up. To save you money I can either shred the check or mail it back to you. I don't want to have you spend money on a cancellation fee.

May you and Maria have a great wedding and until we meet again may life treat you both well.

Russ

Unfortunately today I found out Rashid signed a PA for another house and the email was a lie. He wasted my time. But I am more upset about him and Maria wasting my wife's time. I asked my wife Marianne to help me help Rashid because I was busy. His lie was an insult to my wife and the time she put in. My belief is Rashid Khan ethic's are opposite of my wifes. She only has so many good days to be wasting them on the likes of Rashid Khan.

It makes me mad that we put off going to dinner one night at a nice restaurant and got carry out instead because we were showing houses to Rashid Khan and Maria. My wife is too nice to have wasted time on a person I believe to be a dirtbag like Rashid Khan.

Luckily I have a exclusive buyers agency contract signed by Rashid Khan. So I can go after my commission from the other agent or from him if I choose to. Maybe I'll take my wife out to dinner with the money. She deserves it.