Brandon Greer of Linn County, Or., bought a beat-up duplex across from an elementary school in 2002. In February, three years after he moved in, a sheriff’s deputy knocked on his door and told Greer he was trespassing, The Oregonian reports. The officer said the property was once used as a methamphetamine lab and that the state considered his home uninhabitable. Greer 28, was given four days to move.
Around Oregon, 337 houses, apartments, hotel rooms, and storage units are classified as “unfit for use” by state health authorities. Once used for meth production, the sites need to be tested for hazardous residue, decontaminated, and cleared by the state before they can be inhabited again. Many homes on the list have been purchased by unknowing buyers, some of whom have been evicted for trespassing. The homeowners insist that no one told them they were buying a drug house. They refuse to pay decontamination bills that typically cost as much as $12,000.
Link: http://www.oregonlive.com/news/oregonian/index.ssf?/base/front_page/111295420468540.xml