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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]My grandma inherited a few hilariously bad investments called ground rents somewhere in the vicinity of Baltimore from her old Marylander relatives.  These were an old-fashioned form of land ownership under other people's wholly-owned houses.  The house owners were supposed to pay the fixed cost of the ground rent annually.  Due to inflation, these ancient leases became largely valueless by the 1960s (e.g. $50/yr was real money in the early 1900s and not very much in the 1960s).  To add insult to injury, the land in question ended up becoming a rough neighborhood and after a few more years nobody responded to payment inquiries.

This wasn't any meaningful part of my grandma's assets but it's an interesting DMV tale.  Cousins who inherited the family farmland in Anne Arundel county did a lot better financially.  That land soared in value over 100 years while the other land-backed asset crashed.

[/quote]

that is interesting! the taxes on that land must have been more than the ground rent she got. I’ve only ever heard of that kind of thing with mobile homes. do you know what happened to it? [/quote]

PP.  I only know about Baltimore ground rents from one conversation I had with my grandma 30+ years ago.  And it stuck in my mind because it was so weird.  And a good example of the power of inflation.

Before I posted, I Googled and confirmed that ground rents were indeed a real thing in Baltimore and Maryland.  Because most of them were antique and relatively valueless, the Maryland State govt. passed laws to make it easier for house owners to buy out the ground rent.  Especially if the ground rent had not been billed in a long time.  There's a lot of info on the web if you want details.

My grandma didn't mention having to pay tax on the land.  As I mentioned, the area had become blighted and this was in the late 1980s before massive computerization/online records when we talked about it.  I assume the land was essentially abandoned or the homeowner was paying property tax on the house they owned and nobody cared about separate value for the land underneath.  Her connection ended when people stopped paying her willingly.  I guess when it became such insignificant money, they didn't care anymore.  Or maybe they should have paid her to close out the ground rent and give them clear title...and just didn't.

As I'm remembering now, I think a few of her ground rents were eminent domained for road building and so were cashed out earlier than she stopped collecting rent.

My only interest is understanding what connection my relatives had to that area in historical times.  [/quote]

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