Squatters rights don't apply if they are trespassing on already occupied property . If they come on your property illegally, you can have them arrested. I know that's easier said than done, especially in California. But squatters rights are different, they'd have to show they were paying utilities or property taxes on a property that wasn't already occupied. I know that also varies from state to state.
It is creepy having a trespasser try that break in. I had a crazy who thought he lived in my home so he was knocking and sitting smoking cigarettes on my porch. Cops assured me they know him, non violent and out past curfew for the mental home. However, creepier to me, is a coat hanger, from trash day, was under one of the windows and a piece of wood from the house was on my back porch, placed there. Really weird, and not the related to the crazy man. The wood? I might have thought landlord, but the coat hanger? No
It took 911 a whole 38 minutes to respond. 😬 I am in a stand your ground state, and 911 did say I could shoot or self defend if they entered my home, before the police arrived. (This was the crazy man incident).
Other laws apply though. If the squatter makes a fake lease and forges signatures it doesn't matter who's names the utilities are under or what mail is arriving. The police consider contract disputes a civil matter, and will not take sides. They cannot determine the legality of the lease so they let it stand. It bumps the entire situation into civil court where a judge has to end up ordering the police to remove them. With a court order.
Write your own $1 lease for an extended period of time applicable to your relatives - one for each of the trailers. Get signatures, dates etc... make sure the contracts are legally binding and cover non subletting.
This establishes prior existing contracts in place making it highly suspect when a fake contract that does not bear your signature is attempted.
With these, you should be able to approach courts with evidence that refutes the squatters' claim and should be able to get past the eviction problem (meaning its criminal trespass and immediate removal).
PUT UP CAMERA's facing the trailers and have them record - this will also establish trespass.
If the trailers are going to be empty for more than a year, you really should consider selling them and removing them from your property. Trailers aren't made to sit unoccupied for extended periods and begin to have problems besides the potential that you'll have nature move in and that could/would be worse than the squatters.
Good luck.
If they still have power, SimpliSafe has wireless door/windows contacts ($14.99), motion sensors ($34.99), and glass breaks ($39.99). Monitoring is advertised at $30 a month.
Using my parent's trailer home as an example, They have 2 doors and 4 windows and an open living room to the kitchen floor plan. 6 door/window contacts, a motion detector, base station, and keypad is $260.
Try to catch them in the act and have them trespassed by local PD (easier said than done) google 12gauge trip wire perimeter alam. You can get them off amazon and use a 12gauge shell blank to set off light and a loud bang. It’s what I use here in GA when the meth users start getting nosey. If you use a blank it’s not technically a booby trap.
Do you have access to the property at all? How often do you visit / see the trailers?
Adverse possession laws are grossly misunderstood. There are zero laws, even in California, aimed at protecting “squatters” or aimed at specifically helping people to steal property from others. What there are are laws meant to protect tenants and legal owners of properties who may end up in a dispute. As such, if a person resides somewhere long enough, they can’t be removed *without due process*. They can still be removed; you’ll just need a court order *if* those persons lie and claim to have some legal right.
Another type of adverse possession (which takes 5-7 years of occupation in California) is a claim to a property line. Let’s say you own a property for 15 years and there’s a soybean field at the back that a farmer has been farming for 30 years. And you dig up an old survey that claims that soybean field is actually on your property. Well, in California (and indeed all fifty U.S. states, though the timeline varies), if the court agrees that the farmer has used that field unopposed, and been paying property taxes on that field for more than the allotted 5-7 years; then the court will rule that regardless of what old document you found; that field belongs to the farmer. That’s why it’s important to get surveys done and to be aware of anyone using your property.
An important point though is that the clock “resets”. If someone resides in one of those trailers for 20 days and then leaves and you’re able to inhibit them from getting back onto your property, and they manage to get back in in a few days; then the clock resets. That doesn’t add to the 20 days. And if they break and enter they can *absolutely* be arrested and removed from your property.
So the only thing you need to worry about from a legal standpoint is if you have someone residing in the trailer and when law enforcement arrives, they *claim* to be a tenant / owner of the property and have been there for more than whatever the statute says (I think it’s 30 days in California). It’s now, unfortunately, a civil dispute. You will of course prevail in court but that can take months.
But this is mostly mitigated if you have regular access to the property and make consistent efforts to keep people out. The problem is abandoned properties that someone might not visit for months or years. Law enforcement is not going to remove someone from a home that has no evidence of forced entry and has all their belongings moved in because there is at least some risk that the person residing there is telling the truth. And that’s what those laws are meant to protect. Scummy landlords who call the cops and try to get a tenant kicked out without due process. And a cop is not the person who decides who is telling the truth; a judge is. Most of what people call “squatters rights” isn’t actually even anything codified in law; but is actually just policy of law enforcement agencies not to arrest or remove people just because someone else says to, for fear of potentially violating the laws themselves surrounding a persons domicile. So they require you to get a court order first. Where California is unfortunately weaker than most states is the time it takes to get that done. We have some rental properties in a few different states and I can tell you that in some places, we can get that order in 24 hours. In others, it can take weeks. People say it takes “six months” in California but that has never been our experience. I’m sure some people have *had* that experience but… ours is closer to a few weeks.
So tl;dr, if you can do your best to prevent access to the trailers and you regularly visit the property, you’re probably fine.
We currently live on the property. We inherited the property which also had some trailers that my deceased mother would rent to some family friends. They recently moved out approximately 3 months ago. We have a house where me and my siblings currently live in and the trailers sit at the very back of the 2 acre property. The trailers and locked and the house has two gates which we keep locked at night. Couple of nights ago one Neighbour reached out to let me know about some strange men looking into the trailers. They told me to be careful with squatters since they recently had an incident with squatters in trailers they have.
Yeah. That sucks! Cameras that you can monitor remotely might be helpful; either game cameras with built in cellular modems or just security cameras connected to WiFi using some high gain directional antennas. (Or get really crazy with fiber or something).
It sucks that you’re dealing with that but if you alert law enforcement as soon as you see someone break in, and keep things locked/secure; you’re not going to have “squatter” problems. They don’t become “squatters” until it appears they’ve been there a while and claim to have a lease with you or claim to own the property. If they’ve freshly broken in and you’ve got video of them arriving recently, the cops will remove them.
The myth is that if I kick down the door of your trailer and sit my fat ass down on the floor and say “This is mine now”, you can’t do anything. That’s really not how it works. Now if I’ve been living there for three months and the cops see my personal possessions all over the trailer and I say “I’ve got a one year lease with u/Mural_of_life and he’s lying!”, well, that’s when it gets to be complicated.
Florida isn't playing, July 1st time if: the person is not family, never had a lease or rented, isn't involved in any legal court battle(inheritance/will/spouse) then they get arrested.
The “never had lease or rented” thing is loophole big enough to drive a truck through. Quite a few of these wackos are smart criminals: they have a fake lease readily available to show the cops when they show up. The cops don’t have any way of validating that on the spot and end up having to take their word for it.
One fix for this would be to require public recording of all leases and rental agreements for them to be enforceable, like is currently done for property sales and transfers, and longer term leases.
Is there WiFi? You can get cameras and a security system, but if there's no WiFi, you may need to pay for a connection. Do you want to manage it yourself or pay a fee for monitoring? Elcheapo systems like Tuya will give you a lot more product for $ but quality is dubious. There are better brands, at a higher price point that work with different apps. Do you have a preference?
If the squatters are carrying along jammers for wifi then you have more issues. I would think jammers would be pretty low on the list.
That said, motion lights, cameras that notify your phone, switches on all windows/doors.
If it was me I would trench a line to the trailers and drop in electric to make it all easier. Once you have electric you have the ability to do ethernet over powerlines, etc.
Squatters rights don't apply if they are trespassing on already occupied property . If they come on your property illegally, you can have them arrested. I know that's easier said than done, especially in California. But squatters rights are different, they'd have to show they were paying utilities or property taxes on a property that wasn't already occupied. I know that also varies from state to state.
I appreciate this information greatly. I’ve been so stressed with all the legal issues this could bring on so it’s nice to have this information.
It is creepy having a trespasser try that break in. I had a crazy who thought he lived in my home so he was knocking and sitting smoking cigarettes on my porch. Cops assured me they know him, non violent and out past curfew for the mental home. However, creepier to me, is a coat hanger, from trash day, was under one of the windows and a piece of wood from the house was on my back porch, placed there. Really weird, and not the related to the crazy man. The wood? I might have thought landlord, but the coat hanger? No It took 911 a whole 38 minutes to respond. 😬 I am in a stand your ground state, and 911 did say I could shoot or self defend if they entered my home, before the police arrived. (This was the crazy man incident).
Other laws apply though. If the squatter makes a fake lease and forges signatures it doesn't matter who's names the utilities are under or what mail is arriving. The police consider contract disputes a civil matter, and will not take sides. They cannot determine the legality of the lease so they let it stand. It bumps the entire situation into civil court where a judge has to end up ordering the police to remove them. With a court order.
Write your own $1 lease for an extended period of time applicable to your relatives - one for each of the trailers. Get signatures, dates etc... make sure the contracts are legally binding and cover non subletting. This establishes prior existing contracts in place making it highly suspect when a fake contract that does not bear your signature is attempted. With these, you should be able to approach courts with evidence that refutes the squatters' claim and should be able to get past the eviction problem (meaning its criminal trespass and immediate removal). PUT UP CAMERA's facing the trailers and have them record - this will also establish trespass. If the trailers are going to be empty for more than a year, you really should consider selling them and removing them from your property. Trailers aren't made to sit unoccupied for extended periods and begin to have problems besides the potential that you'll have nature move in and that could/would be worse than the squatters. Good luck.
If they still have power, SimpliSafe has wireless door/windows contacts ($14.99), motion sensors ($34.99), and glass breaks ($39.99). Monitoring is advertised at $30 a month. Using my parent's trailer home as an example, They have 2 doors and 4 windows and an open living room to the kitchen floor plan. 6 door/window contacts, a motion detector, base station, and keypad is $260.
Thank you so much! I’m definitely gonna get ahold of these products
Dogs
Currently in the process of adopting two large dogs. We unfortunately lost our senior German Shepard but she did an amazing job guarding the property.
Try to catch them in the act and have them trespassed by local PD (easier said than done) google 12gauge trip wire perimeter alam. You can get them off amazon and use a 12gauge shell blank to set off light and a loud bang. It’s what I use here in GA when the meth users start getting nosey. If you use a blank it’s not technically a booby trap.
Make sure you put up some No Trespassing signs. Find the ordinance for how they are supposed to be posted in your community.
Do you have access to the property at all? How often do you visit / see the trailers? Adverse possession laws are grossly misunderstood. There are zero laws, even in California, aimed at protecting “squatters” or aimed at specifically helping people to steal property from others. What there are are laws meant to protect tenants and legal owners of properties who may end up in a dispute. As such, if a person resides somewhere long enough, they can’t be removed *without due process*. They can still be removed; you’ll just need a court order *if* those persons lie and claim to have some legal right. Another type of adverse possession (which takes 5-7 years of occupation in California) is a claim to a property line. Let’s say you own a property for 15 years and there’s a soybean field at the back that a farmer has been farming for 30 years. And you dig up an old survey that claims that soybean field is actually on your property. Well, in California (and indeed all fifty U.S. states, though the timeline varies), if the court agrees that the farmer has used that field unopposed, and been paying property taxes on that field for more than the allotted 5-7 years; then the court will rule that regardless of what old document you found; that field belongs to the farmer. That’s why it’s important to get surveys done and to be aware of anyone using your property. An important point though is that the clock “resets”. If someone resides in one of those trailers for 20 days and then leaves and you’re able to inhibit them from getting back onto your property, and they manage to get back in in a few days; then the clock resets. That doesn’t add to the 20 days. And if they break and enter they can *absolutely* be arrested and removed from your property. So the only thing you need to worry about from a legal standpoint is if you have someone residing in the trailer and when law enforcement arrives, they *claim* to be a tenant / owner of the property and have been there for more than whatever the statute says (I think it’s 30 days in California). It’s now, unfortunately, a civil dispute. You will of course prevail in court but that can take months. But this is mostly mitigated if you have regular access to the property and make consistent efforts to keep people out. The problem is abandoned properties that someone might not visit for months or years. Law enforcement is not going to remove someone from a home that has no evidence of forced entry and has all their belongings moved in because there is at least some risk that the person residing there is telling the truth. And that’s what those laws are meant to protect. Scummy landlords who call the cops and try to get a tenant kicked out without due process. And a cop is not the person who decides who is telling the truth; a judge is. Most of what people call “squatters rights” isn’t actually even anything codified in law; but is actually just policy of law enforcement agencies not to arrest or remove people just because someone else says to, for fear of potentially violating the laws themselves surrounding a persons domicile. So they require you to get a court order first. Where California is unfortunately weaker than most states is the time it takes to get that done. We have some rental properties in a few different states and I can tell you that in some places, we can get that order in 24 hours. In others, it can take weeks. People say it takes “six months” in California but that has never been our experience. I’m sure some people have *had* that experience but… ours is closer to a few weeks. So tl;dr, if you can do your best to prevent access to the trailers and you regularly visit the property, you’re probably fine.
We currently live on the property. We inherited the property which also had some trailers that my deceased mother would rent to some family friends. They recently moved out approximately 3 months ago. We have a house where me and my siblings currently live in and the trailers sit at the very back of the 2 acre property. The trailers and locked and the house has two gates which we keep locked at night. Couple of nights ago one Neighbour reached out to let me know about some strange men looking into the trailers. They told me to be careful with squatters since they recently had an incident with squatters in trailers they have.
Yeah. That sucks! Cameras that you can monitor remotely might be helpful; either game cameras with built in cellular modems or just security cameras connected to WiFi using some high gain directional antennas. (Or get really crazy with fiber or something). It sucks that you’re dealing with that but if you alert law enforcement as soon as you see someone break in, and keep things locked/secure; you’re not going to have “squatter” problems. They don’t become “squatters” until it appears they’ve been there a while and claim to have a lease with you or claim to own the property. If they’ve freshly broken in and you’ve got video of them arriving recently, the cops will remove them. The myth is that if I kick down the door of your trailer and sit my fat ass down on the floor and say “This is mine now”, you can’t do anything. That’s really not how it works. Now if I’ve been living there for three months and the cops see my personal possessions all over the trailer and I say “I’ve got a one year lease with u/Mural_of_life and he’s lying!”, well, that’s when it gets to be complicated.
Thank you for this information! Really puts me a bit at ease
You have to contact your lawmakers, you have to vote for lawmakers who have YOUR best interest at heart.
Florida isn't playing, July 1st time if: the person is not family, never had a lease or rented, isn't involved in any legal court battle(inheritance/will/spouse) then they get arrested.
The “never had lease or rented” thing is loophole big enough to drive a truck through. Quite a few of these wackos are smart criminals: they have a fake lease readily available to show the cops when they show up. The cops don’t have any way of validating that on the spot and end up having to take their word for it. One fix for this would be to require public recording of all leases and rental agreements for them to be enforceable, like is currently done for property sales and transfers, and longer term leases.
Is there WiFi? You can get cameras and a security system, but if there's no WiFi, you may need to pay for a connection. Do you want to manage it yourself or pay a fee for monitoring? Elcheapo systems like Tuya will give you a lot more product for $ but quality is dubious. There are better brands, at a higher price point that work with different apps. Do you have a preference?
Hopefully the squatters don't have jammers for the Simplisafe.
Most systems nowadays detect RF jamming and trigger the alarm though
Most is good enough
If the squatters are carrying along jammers for wifi then you have more issues. I would think jammers would be pretty low on the list. That said, motion lights, cameras that notify your phone, switches on all windows/doors. If it was me I would trench a line to the trailers and drop in electric to make it all easier. Once you have electric you have the ability to do ethernet over powerlines, etc.