Henrietta Obolosky is Such a Lovely Name

The Birmingham title issue for this home we are trying to sell has taken a turn for the crazy. Essentially, the buyer is not able to get title insurance on the property because a quit claim deed, which was filed and recorded, has disappeared.

But where was it last seen, you may ask? It would be one of two reasonable places. The first would be with Jefferson County. I know we here who do not live in Alabama do things a bit differently, but when a deed is recorded here, the county makes a copy of it and attaches it to the property address. This is standard procedure. In fact, I recently helped someone file a quit claim and waited patiently as the clerk scanned in the deed and electronically linked it to their site as part of the recording process. But we are only a measly metropolitan area of 6 million, so what do we know?

The other place it would--or should--be is Late Attorney Jon's files. Until this week, I had no idea the deeds were actually handed back after recordation. And if that is the case, it would have been Late Attorney Jon who would have had it. But Legal Owl and Attorney Flip assure me they have combed through Late Attorney Jon's files. It isn't there. And for their box digging I am sure I will be billed some outrageous rate.

Legal Owl's solution (because she is now dragged into this drama) is to sign an affidavit. At first I thought this was a dandy solution. Marty would sign it and we would be closing next week. It turns out Legal Owl really meant that the missing tenant must sign the damn thing.

The tenant in question does not have a name such as "Henrietta Obolosky," or any such name that would be uncommon enough to find. Oh no! Her name is akin to Mary Jones. What is hurting this process is that I have no way to find Mary Jones. I do not have a phone number, forwarding address from 2008 and I don't receive Christmas cards from her after I kicked her deadbeat ass out of my home.

Kirby however, has begun the search for Ms Jones. Today he sent me a Facebook post and asked if that woman was her. I never met her. I don't know what she looks like. Nor do I know what color her skin happens to be. What I did know was that it really isn't Kirby's job to track down former tenants from eight years ago at 11 p.m. on a Tuesday night and send them messages via social media to see if they may or may not have rented to me.

After I got over the initial shock at such kindness he was doing for me (though he is that kind of guy), I told him to offer Ms Jones $50 if she would sign a quit claim deed. After all, what we need is just a notarized signature on a piece of paper with this woman's name on it. So even if it isn't the right Mary Jones, we might be able to clear this up once and for all.