A NEW KIND OF SHARK PROWLS THE EASTERN SHORE

Y'all check out the classifieds of the latest Worcerster County Times? If you do, you'll notice a pile of forclosure notices posted by a lawyer named Heidi S. Kenny. She's apparently in the business of buying up ground rents in default, tacking on huge "legal fees" and then foreclosing. The end result is that she presents the homeowners occupying the land with huge bills. And if they are unable to pay, they're evicted and the property reverts to her possession.
Kenny's gotten some kind of fame lately, around the Baltimore area for taking properties after ground rents fall in arrears.
The Baltimore Sun last month published a story that, while having a mutually beneficial resolution, was not happy, because what started out as an unpaid pill for $72 meant that the homeowners had to cough up nearly $18,000 in order to keep from having their home taken from them. Oh, the homeowners still were only seventy-some-odd bucks in the hole for ground rent, but the rest of that bill was for legal fees and such.
The whole concept of ground rent is as foreign to me as eating goats eyes in the Sahara, but the link does an excellant job of explaining the bit Real Estate legal esoterica.... Be that as it may, Ms. Kenny has branched out from her Baltimore stomping grounds and has expanded her reach to Worcester County.
Among the properties up for foreclosure is one on Market Street in Snow Hill and five acres of improved property on Gum Point Road.
It makes me want to check our deed and make sure there's no little surprises in the fine print.