I guess it would depend on a lot of things. The value of a property is never just on the size of it. In fact it is mainly NOT on the size of it, though size could be used as a comparison. I once sold a house. When the appraisal company came out they took pictures, did measurements, etc. Then they went out and found the last 3 houses that sold in the area, averaged the sales price of those three and that was the appraised value. That was, I felt, unfair to me. I had a 1400 sqft house with a detached 2 car garage and a concrete driveway that could fit 7 cars, all on an oversized corner lot. I was compared to a house that was 1100 sqft with no garage, a house that was 900 sqft that had a grass driveway and a detached 1 car garage and a house that was 790 sqft with a garage that was falling in. All were on smaller lots. Some didn’t even have the same number of bedrooms or bathrooms I had.
Another thing issue is the size. Was it still 11,000 sqft? Was it ever 11,000 sqft or could the county have it wrong? Was it listed as 30,000 in error? Had it been added onto? When was the last time the county did a physical evaluation for tax purposes? These are just things I don’t know.
And the last would be what the loan rules are from the banks. Do they just run over to tax records to check? Or do they get an appraisal? Or did they do anything? When you get a home loan, the lending institution will get an appraisal done unless they had one done within a certain time frame (usually <6 months). They also do a title check. These things are done to determine the worth of the property. This is where it all gets a bit wonky. The bank never takes the word of the person they are going to loan money to as the final determining factor in any of this. Nor do they take the word of the appraiser if they didn’t hire him. So the bank had to have had someone that told them the value of the property. As I said earlier, the square footage may or may not matter in that appraisal.
And the last part of all this that really hits me as odd is that they are trying to get Trump on a Fraud case. I had to look up the definition of Fraud to see what it is, legally. Here is an explanation I found:
“Fraud must be proved by showing that the defendant’s actions involved five separate elements: (1) a false statement of a material fact,(2) knowledge on the part of the defendant that the statement is untrue, (3) intent on the part of the defendant to deceive the alleged victim, (4) justifiable reliance by the alleged victim on the statement, and (5) injury to the alleged victim as a result.
These elements contain nuances that are not all easily proved. First, not all false statements are fraudulent. To be fraudulent, a false statement must relate to a material fact. It should also substantially affect a person’s decision to enter into a contract or pursue a certain course of action. A false statement of fact that does not bear on the disputed transaction will not be considered fraudulent.
Second, the defendant must know that the statement is untrue. A statement of fact that is simply mistaken is not fraudulent. To be fraudulent, a false statement must be made with intent to deceive the victim. This is perhaps the easiest element to prove, once falsity and materiality are proved, because most material false statements are designed to mislead.
Third, the false statement must be made with the intent to deprive the victim of some legal right.
Fourth, the victim’s reliance on the false statement must be reasonable. Reliance on a patently absurd false statement generally will not give rise to fraud; however, people who are especially gullible, superstitious, or ignorant or who are illiterate may recover damages for fraud if the defendant knew and took advantage of their condition.
Finally, the false statement must cause the victim some injury that leaves her or him in a worse position than she or he was in before the fraud.”
So going to a lending institution to get a loan and putting a property up as collateral seems to challenge these requirements. Yes, one could claim something that was materially false to start with. But again, lending institutions don’t take your word for it. They have procedures in place to verify for themselves. So this claim doesn’t mean much. The “victim” doesn’t reasonably rely on anything the defendant said since they check for themselves. Another problem is that even if they did just take Trump at his word, did it change anything? Did he default on the loans and leave them holding a worthless property? No. As was noted, he paid the loans so the bank didn’t get hurt by anything.
This seems to be an overblown effort to “Get Trump”. Probably for political reasons.
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