April 10, 2025 at 10:15 am

Condo Owner Tried To Work With His Bank To Sell His Apartment, But Their Refusal Cost Them Tens Of Thousands In The End

by Heide Lazaro

Freepik/Reddit

Sometimes, bureaucracy makes things harder than they need to be.

This man owned an apartment in the 90s and struggled to sell it.

When he asked his bank for help, they refused.

So he took something they said seriously and used it to his advantage.

Read the story below to find out more.

Bank incompetence cost themselves 10’s of thousands

Many years ago, I owned an apartment when real estate crashed.

This was early 90’s in New York City.

I couldn’t sell it.

I was renting it out for less than the mortgage payment.

This man sought help from the bank.

When I tried to talk to the bank, they said:

“You’ve never missed a payment, why should we talk to you?”

So, I missed a payment.

I sent the rent I got to the bank, but they insisted on either full payment or nothing.

So, he sent the bank nothing.

Enter my malicious compliance.

I sent nothing.

At one point, the bank told me this:

The reason I couldn’t sell it was I wasn’t asking enough money for it.

He offered them a check, but the bank declined.

Both my and my attorney’s response was: “What the heck?!”

When this first started, I offered them a check for the difference between the appraised value and what I owned just to get it off my hands.

But, they said no.

Eventually, he was able to sell it for the original amount he offered.

Finally, a year later, I sold it for much less than I owed.

The bank accepted a check in the amount I originally offered, but because of their incompetence, they never collected the years’ worth of missed payments.

They tried to report to the credit bureau that they had foreclosed.

I disputed it since they never actually foreclosed.

Some bank rules don’t seem to make sense.

Let’s check out the comments of other people on Reddit.

Short and simple.