911 survivor can't get to her home

 

Recently Jill was able to buy a lovely retirement home. It is on top of a mountain with beautiful views. Peaceful and wonderful she thought.  The only access is via a dirt and gravel road which is common in the mountainous region of western North Carolina.  She rented a home on-top of a mountain for years so she is accustomed to driving these dirt and gravel roads.  But, nothing like this.

The driveway is unsafe. It has no base and the draining is improper so even though she has already had two 18-ton truckloads of road-bond put down and has had the road scraped and packed 3 times the problems continue. There are extreme safety issues and at times the roadway is unpassable. She has only lived in the house for 9 days and has been towed up twice, has had to park a mile away 4 of those days and walk up the very steep driveway. The rest of the days she struggles to get up the driveway.. sometimes backing up and trying again 4 or 5 times.

The seller who is an investor pleads the 5th and says that gravel roads require maintenance.  Jill has lived on a gravel/dirt road for years.  A properly installed driveway needs maintenance once or twice a year.  Those photos below are 2 days after the roadway was scraped and packed and this repeats day after day.

Imagine not being able to drive to your house. She was not told of any road access issues when she bought the house and there is nothing related to the gravel roadway and driveway mentioned in the disclosures. She needs to get the driveway properly fixed and hire an attorney to sue the unscrupulous investor she bought the property from.  According to the original owner he knew about the problems and did not disclose it to her.

Sometimes she manages to get up to her house but she is fearful she will lose control of the car and end up in a deep ditch or over the edge of the montain since the road is in such bad shape. As cars travel up and down it creates grooves which causes her car to swerve. She doesn't feel safe and is starting to panic when thinking about driving on that unsafe driveway.

 

Jill is semi-retired on social security. Needless to say she needs safe access to/from her house. She needs to have the driveway properly graded, proper drainage and pave the driveway or some other solution to create a safe environment for her.

Due to health issues she did not work from Dec 2018 to April 2019. She is working part-time now but does not have the funds to fix the driveway. She has already paid out over $1,000 for gravel and scraping etc in less than a month.  There is no way she can afford to keep fixing the road every few days.

When she bought the house she had a contingency but it has been devoured by having contractors attempt to smooth out (scrape) the driveway. Then she was told she needed 2 truckloads of road bond. So, her contingency and cushion is gone due to these unexpected expenses. Ontop of all this the unscrupulous investor she bought the house from said he winterized the house. But that was not done properly either so she had to pay a plumber over $200 to fix leaks and broken pipes. The investor did not drain the water from the hose connected to the washing machine and the connector and hose froze and cracked which has cost another $300. Plus the wall oven doesn't work so the list goes on and on..

 

She collects social security and made sure her basic expenses including house payment and car payment are covered by social security. The house she bought is less than 4 years old and she expected to have minimal issues with a new house.  The house itself is fine, but this driveway situation was not disclosed and is extremely DANGEROUS, troublesome and stressful.

 

'IMAGINE THE STRESS OF LEAVING YOUR HOME AND NOT KNOWING IF YOU CAN GET BACK UP THE DRIVEWAY TO YOUR OWN HOME'

 

Jill dealt with a very sad and unexpected loss of her emotional support animal Chanel in January of this year.  She had been seeing her trauma therapist 3 times a week to work through her intense grief.  The purchase of this house was the beginning of her moving out of a depression towards healing and rebuilding her life. Due to the driveway issues Jill has dealt with extreme stress which have caused panic attacks, anxiety and elevated blood pressure. She can't even get up to her own house. She has had 3 contractors attempt to fix the gravel road but within days of the repairs the road is again impassable.  She is concerned if she needs to go to the emergency room or doctors appointments or takes one of her dogs to the vet that she is going to be unable to navigate up the gravel driveway and fears getting stuck again.  Her worst fear is getting stuck in the dark on that gravel road or ending up in the ditch or going off the side of the mountain. Even going out for groceries she anticipates creates stress because she has no idea if she can make it back home. 

 

GEICO Emergency Road service has towed her twice and informed her that any further tows will be at her expense. They towed her about 200 or 300 feet through the loose dirt and gravel to get to her house

 

Please partner with Jill to help her fix the driveway and provide safe access to her home.  It is a first step to her healing process.  Her new home was supposed to bring joy back into her life.  She lost her dream home in 2013 after 2 years of suffering from COPD, pneumonia and related breathing issues.  She has undergone some alternative treatments and health-wise is doing ok. Your partnership to assist Jill in having peace of mind and safety to travel to/from her own home is invaluable to her. The monies will be spent either paving the driveway or installing a grid system used by agriculture and military. Her driveway is approx 600 linear feet.  One method known as tar and chip is less expensive than paving with asphalt and has better traction. But so far has not found a contractor who does that. She is also looking into a solution used by the military and agriculture called ecoraster. She got a quote of $16,000 for materials alone for the ecoraster system. The average cost to fix her driveway ranges between $20,000-25,000. She needs all the dirt and gravel removed FIRST and large rocks put down as a base and then regraded with proper drainage put in. 

In addition she needs to hire an attorney to file a lawsuit against this unscrupulous investor for fraud and misrepresentation.  He need to be held accountable for his misrepresentations as well as refusal to fix necessities.

 

Here is an article on the tar and chip method.  https://www.thespruce.com/pros-and-cons-of-tar-and-chip-driveway-1398079

 

Here is a link to the website for the ecoraster grid system used in the  military and agriculture as well as residential.  Jill spoke to the rep in NC who feels this is an ideal and cost effective solution.  https://www.ecorastergrid.com/. He quotes a price of $16,000 just for materials. She still needs the base, proper drainage and installation.

UPDATE, The house has electrical issues and endless nuisance issues. She reached out to Jonathan Scott hoping he could at least guide her in tge right direction. So far no response.

This is Chanel - Jill's beautiful dog that passed away in January. Chanel was Jill's emotional support dog.  This was her as a beautiful puppy.  She was only 4 when she tragically died.


Here are some photos of the roadway after light rain.


Jill's house is all the way up the hill.




You can see the drop off the side of the mountain in the photo above. You can also see the tire marks to the right where she has skidded.



Thank you and God Bless!

PS - If you are a driveway contractor or attorney in western NC (Asheville area) who can help, please contact me.