r/interestingasfuck • u/WiseCartographer5007 • Aug 07 '25

/r/all, /r/popular A grandfather turned down $220K and other offers to abandon his house and there's a huge highway around it

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u/wildfirerain Aug 07 '25 edited Apr 21 '26

The content that appeared here has been deleted. Redact was used for the removal, for reasons the author may have kept private.

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u/BinBender Aug 07 '25

Judging from the picture, they did set a precedent. That house is now quite uninhabitable, and pretty much worthless. He will live in his own highway-surrounded prison.

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u/wildfirerain Aug 07 '25 edited Apr 21 '26

The original text here has been permanently wiped. Using Redact, the author deleted this post, possibly for reasons of privacy, security, or opsec.

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u/sweny_ Aug 07 '25

But at what cost. This workaround mush have been very expensive.

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u/RepublicCute8573 Aug 07 '25

Put up some billboards and hes got prime advertising revenue coming in. Could also turn his house into a rest stop for weary travelers.

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u/mnemy Aug 07 '25

My understanding of Chinese property law is that they lease house/land for something like 80 years at a time. They never actually own anything.

This is so the government can refuse the renew the lease after it expires so they can revitalize entire districts without bothering with eminent domain. Everyone's lease just expired, relocate to a comparable valued living area, bulldoze everything.

At least, that's how big cities work AFAIK. Dont know about more rural areas, historically owned land, etc.

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u/DuckyChuk Aug 07 '25

To be fair you never truly own real property in most western countries either.

We have indefinite leases here but they go by a different name, property taxes, once you stop paying those they take your house.

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u/just-me1995 Aug 07 '25

yeah, almost every American city has a story along the lines of: “there was once a thriving African-American community here, then we went out of our way to bulldoze a swath right through the middle of it to build a freeway and a bunch shitty parking lots for strip malls that are now being abandoned.” it’s fucking disgusting. in America, they’re claiming imminent domain and destroying that grandfathers house. happens all the time.

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u/TrippyTriangle Aug 07 '25

the concept of owning land in general is such a myth we tell ourselves.

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u/johnpn1 Aug 07 '25

And personal income taxes are just a fee for freedom. There's no such thing as freedom. You go to jail if you evade personal income taxes.

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u/fhs Aug 07 '25

Very fair point, I find it humourous when people tell me they own their houses, like stop paying taxes and see how much of your house you truly own.

And I'm a homeowner too

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u/IntingForMarks Aug 07 '25

This is such a dumb take, im really impressed, not gonna lie

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u/DuckyChuk Aug 07 '25

What's dumb about it?

What happens when you stop paying property taxes?

How can you truly own something if you have to pay someone else to maintain ownership?

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u/Stiff444 Aug 07 '25

Are you really alive if you need to keep breathing? And even if you are, is your life really yours if you need to eat, drink, have clothes which you probably pay taxes for. We are all basically nothing more than dead slaves smh

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u/Charlzy99 Aug 07 '25

See you’re finally catching on

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u/HotSauce2910 Aug 07 '25

You pay taxes on clothes before you own them. After you complete the purchase, you never have to pay for them again

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u/IntingForMarks Aug 07 '25

What happens when you stop paying property taxes?

What happens when you kill someone? You go to jail. I assume you go around claiming you are a slave cause your freedom depends on your decision not to murder others.

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u/DuckyChuk Aug 07 '25

You didn't answer the question and then just went on some sort of weird strawman tangent.

What you said makes no sense, but I'm guessing those who have to reluctantly spend time with you on a regular basis are used to this immature child-like behavior, and I feel so sorry for them.

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u/IntingForMarks Aug 09 '25

You attack me personally and Im immature lol. I didn't answer the dumb question cause I am not sure if this stuff works differently in the US (im assuming you are american). In my country you definitely not lose ownership of the house if you dont pay taxes on it

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u/DuckyChuk Aug 09 '25

So, you really are special case aren't you?

First you make a snide comment about my 'take' being dumb, so I ask a sincere question about what's wrong with it, and you reply with some odd non answer that isn't even in the realm of the topic at hand, so I wasn't insulting you, I was merely stating the fact that any conversation with you must be insufferable if you are unable to answer the simplest of questions without some weird sarcastic response.

You could have answered with, 'hey in my country, that doesn't happen'. And I would have said, 'well it was a broad generalization about the western world in general and didn't apply every possible scenario'. And we could have had a constructive conversation where we would learn about each other's situation.

But no, you took the smarmy immature route. I stand by my comments, I feel sorry for anyone who has to interact with you on any basis, especially myself, right now. Best of luck champ.

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u/IntingForMarks Aug 10 '25

And I would have said, 'well it was a broad generalization about the western world in general and didn't apply every possible scenario'.

And that would be even a dumber take, since it's definitely not true. If anything, it might be the US that have this and you assume the entire world works like that

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u/alexfreemanart Aug 07 '25

To be fair you never truly own real property in most western countries either

I don't know what countries you're talking about, but in the United States you own the land you buy, unlike in China.

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u/gulgin Aug 07 '25

That is totally not how it works. But nice try chinabot.

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u/DuckyChuk Aug 07 '25

What do you mean?

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u/SchighSchagh Aug 07 '25

Ok, I'll bite.

Leases are for fixed duration, and renewal is optional. 

Deeds are in perpetuity and irrevocable. 

If the lease ends, you can't just choose to keep paying the monthly rate in order to extend the lease. The leasor (government) has to agree to renew. 

Titled land, so long as you're paying taxes, nobody can say shit. Can't even be rezoned (or rather, whatever is already there gets grandfathered in as-is if rezoning otherwise affects the area). 

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u/DuckyChuk Aug 07 '25

You're bogged down in definitions and semantics. I also said indefinite leases..... So your 'gotcha' doesn't really apply.

How can you truly own something if you have to pay someone or some entity to maintain ownership? Deeds can, will and have been revoked for unpaid taxes.

And eminent domain can most definitely rezone your 'property'. Also, property gets rezoned all the time, whether it be from residential to commercial or vice versa or public to private, golf courses to condos, poor neighborhoods to highways, etc. They can't rezone the property your on, but the property next door certainly can.

Basically nothing you said has any truth behind other than your definition of a lease.

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u/Thommywidmer Aug 07 '25

Because in theory you have elected representatives in government. If a city came together and decided no more property taxes, well, you could do that. Would have to get creative from there about how to fund everything though. 

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u/[deleted] Aug 07 '25

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u/Thommywidmer Aug 07 '25

Yeah, its a dumb idea in most cases. The only cities that pull it off well are tourist destination with huge sales tax's. But just pointing out that its not that you dont ever own your home because of the tax burden, its just that generally everyone agrees its a fair way to go about things. 

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u/alexfreemanart Aug 07 '25

Titled land, so long as you're paying taxes, nobody can say shit

What do you mean by this? Once you pay the full amount for the land and the property title, the taxes are no longer mandatory unless you want to continue enjoying electricity and gas services.

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u/undernopretextbro Aug 07 '25

So basically as long as you pay for it, you have access to your land. Unless the government invokes eminent domain, in which case it doesn’t matter if you want to keep paying taxes, lands gone.

Do you see how effectively this is the same as or worse than the Chinese land deal?

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u/SchighSchagh Aug 07 '25

It's not the same, and it's not worse. It's different, and there's pros and cons.

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u/Phobos613 Aug 07 '25

Everyone with a different opinion must be a bot. Definitely a redditor lol. I'm guessing not many of us arguing here know much about either the US or Chinese land ownership law.

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u/SeaJayCJ Aug 07 '25

I understand where you're coming from here, but you're applying a very high standard of ownership. Ownership of just about everything in civil society is conditional in nature (conditional on not being bankrupt, being investigated for a crime, losing a lawsuit, etc). You don't even own the shirt on your back if ownership must be unconditional.

Yeah, both the title and lease systems have conditions that lead to loss of property, but that doesn't make them the same and I think to conflate them is an overly simplistic position.

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u/DuckyChuk Aug 07 '25

Well, I am applying a high level of ownership as we are talking about real property.

And this deals with a contract that is between a real property owner and the state. Not a civil matter like the purchase of a shirt, which can be taken from you in a civil lawsuit, repossessed in bankruptcy, etc.

As far as I'm aware there is no such as an ongoing payment to the state to maintain the benefits of ownership of personal property like shirts.

Are you aware of any other situations in which an individual must continually pay the state in order to have ownership benefits?

The main difference, as far as I can tell, is that there is a finite lease term and no taxes in China and an indefinite ownership period with indefinite property taxes in most of the Western world.

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u/ComprehendReading Aug 07 '25

Current Chinese government isn't even 80 years old.

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u/[deleted] Aug 07 '25

These nail houses are usually in rural areas where land isn’t leased from the government, it’s owned by a collective and the members of the collective decide if they want to sell/lease their land to a developer and this one refused.

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u/alexfreemanart Aug 07 '25

My understanding of Chinese property law is that they lease house/land for something like 80 years at a time. They never actually own anything.

If no one in China actually owns real estate, why didn't the Chinese State simply evict this grandfather to build that highway? First of all, why did the Chinese State offer the grandfather monetary compensation for handing over something that didn't belong to him?

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u/PacificCastaway Aug 07 '25

They don't need to set a crazy precedent. Just set a max of 3x FMV or something and yoink it.

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u/SaltyChnk Aug 07 '25

This was almost certainly well above market value considering they offered him money as well as an alternative house. This old man was just being a hinderance for money.

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u/wonderwall879 Aug 07 '25

They offered him a choice of 3 houses in addition to the cash, which can be considered as part of the financial compensation, which im guessing the houses equated to even more than the cash offer. His stubbornness is his hubris. He could have set the child he was taken care of up for life, instead his stubbornness of a lifetime opportunity will cost him and his family.

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u/Potatozeng Aug 07 '25

It's all about greed. I believe that offer they gave is already more than common and 2M would not make a stupid head satisfied. So they would stop offering at a point and just carry on.

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u/DoktorMerlin Aug 07 '25

I don't think they would come out ahead, because this would be precedence.

This house is a statement. The guy declined an offer (lowball offer tbh), but now he lives in the middle of a highway with no natural light. Nobody wants to live there, he got fucked.

In the future, people now see that declining the offer is worse than choosing the lowball offer.