Tucson By Choice!: I'm a Googling Law Breaker!

I waited in line patiently for more than 20 minutes.  My turn came, my name was called, and I approached the counter with all the confidence of a sinner at the pearly gates.

Four weeks earlier, Elouisa (not her name) and her REALTOR®,  agonized over the offer of $150,000 for a manufactured home listed at $165,000.  Moving out of a small condo into a home with more than an acre of horse property was a dream she hoped would come true.  She signed the offer.  A day later, she was in escrow.

Things went downhill.  The appraisal came in at $130,000.  An inspection showed that the seller had stripped out a swamp cooler. (google it.)  No deed of affixture existed. Without it, we had a nice piece of unimproved land and an oversized piece of personal property governed by the division of motor vehicles.

The REALTOR®,  was fantastic as a dual agent.  He kept everyone sane, and the sellers agreed to take the $130,000.  The sellers replaced the swamp cooler.  We applied to the county assessor for a deed of affixture.

The underwriter re-examined the appraisal, and conditioned us to provide her with copies of the original permits to erect the horse shed (400 s.f. of poles and aluminum roof to shade the horses from the Arizona sun.)

No permits existed.  The U/W said to get permits.  The REALTOR®,  tried, and emailed me saying that his research showed that no permit was required by local code, but that the building department would not give him anything in writing.  Can't be, I thought.

So here I was, a week after this should have been put to bed, standing at the counter, hat in hand, so to speak.  I used to be a builder.  I've built 350 homes.  I know building codes.  "We don't have a local building code any longer," said the clerk.  "We subscribe to IRC." 

I explained my situation, and asked if I could just photocopy the appropiate page out of the IRC-2006 to send to the underwriter.  "Can't do that," he said.  I wondered aloud why not.  "It's a book. It's copyrighted.  Can't copy stuff that's copyrighted.  But if you look right here, you can see what we require."  I mentioned that the U/W couldn't see it, and wasn't likely to believe me if I wrote a letter explaining that the county had a rule, but they didn't want people to actually have the printed page."

"You could always go to the library."  People behind me were getting antsy.  "So they'll let me photocopy it?"  "Probably not," was the reply, "it's copyrighted, you know."

I decided then and there to become a lawbreaker.  "Where can I buy the book?"  "Oh, you don't want to do that," he exclaimed.  "It'll cost you a hundert and five dollars."  (He had no idea how badly I wanted to do just that.) 

God bless the internet.  Within the hour I had located, purchased and downloaded a pdf version, and was printing away--copyright laws be damned!

Please don't turn me in.  Docs went out today, and we'll sign on Monday.  Have a great weekend.  Illegitimi non carborundum.  (It's a Fight song!  google it.)

I'm Mike in Tucson, your preferred Tucson, AZ mortgage lender.