Judge OKs Sale of Widow's House Over $6.30 in Unpaid Interest
A judge has approved the 2011 sale of a Pennsylvania widow's house, finding that she had received ample notice about the $6.30 in tax interest that she still owed.
Eileen Battisti's western Pennsylvania home, valued at $280,000, was sold at auction for $116,000. The money will go to her if she loses her next appeal in the state's Commonwealth Court and has to move out of the house.
"I paid everything, and didn't know about the $6.30," Battisti told the Associated Press. "For the house to be sold just because of $6.30 is crazy."
Battisti says her husband handled all the paperwork on the house until he died in 2004.
But despite the tiny amount of money in play, Beaver County Common Pleas Judge Gus Kwidis ruled against Battisti because the county tax assessor gave her appropriate written notice that it planned to sell her home.
"There is no doubt that (she) had actual receipt of the notification of the tax upset sale on July 7, 2011, and Aug. 16, 2011," the judge wrote. "Moreover, on Aug. 12, 2011, a notice of sale was sent by first class mail and was not returned."
Beaver County Solicitor Joe Askar was sympathetic, but said the judge got the case right based on the letter of the law.
"It's bad - she had some hard times, I guess her husband kind of took care of a lot of that stuff," Askar said. "It seemed that she was having a hard time coping with the loss of her husband - that just made it set in a little more."
The buyer of the house hasn't publicly commented on the case.
