The author, James H. Eblen, is a retired United States Air Force Master Sergeant. He has also been a Realtor since 1968 and received his Graduate of Realtors Institute (GRI) Certificate in 1978.
He started developing real estate in 1976. He developed real estate from 1976 until 1991. By 1987 he had developed six successful projects when he was approached by two attorneys who requested to join his company, Eblen Industries, Inc. This book is about two major subjects and how they interact one with the other. On the one hand we have two young less than honest attorneys and how they manipulated the second major subject to steal a small fortune from the author. This story is not about blame. Yes they were wrong in stealing, but the author in his naive should share some blame in being too trusting. The author had a real estate development company and these two attorneys asked to join his development company. What follows is what happened when they did, and how they used the most liberal parts of the law as a weapon to steal. They joined the company effective April 15, 1988, at which time Lakemont Development, Inc, Landmark Builders Inc., and Elite Mortgage Inc. were formed. Thus began a three year battle between the right way and anyway to win, and the sixteen year aftermath.
Three paragraphs about Lakemont from their prospectus in 2007 and lifted from the web after the theft are worthy of note. They are:
1. Today the Lakemont Companies is a full service real estate group specializing in the development, construction, marketing and sale of residential real estate projects and, with its project partnerships, manages and controls fifteen active residential communities throughout Northern California and Nevada.
2. In 2000, the Lakemont Companies and its partnerships sold 438 homes and closed escrow on 270 homes. As of October 2001, the Lakemont Companies and its project partnerships projected to close escrow on 470 homes with gross sales of $100,000,000 for 2001. Sales of this magnitude indicate a net profit in the 12% to 15% range. As of October 2001, the Lakemont Companies and its project partnerships held a total of 1,095 lots.
3. Founded in 1987, Lakemont began with two employees and four partners, each with different expertise in land development, construction, legal and accounting - but with one common trait - a - true passion for real estate business. In the 20 years since, Lakemont has remained a privately held company and has grown by seeking out, and assembling a management team with decades of experience and expertise in all disciplines of the real estate development and construction industry. Now with over 200 employees, the Lakemont team is a full service real estate development, construction and management group specializing in land acquisition, community planning and design, land entitlements and infrastructure development for residential and mixed-use real estate projects. The end result is the legacy of the company. The Lakemont team is currently developing several communities totaling over 12,000 acres for the creation of over 20,000 homes in family and age-qualified neighborhoods."
James has found throughout his life experiences there is confusion in that other people seemingly do not understand the rules. They think they do because they can quote chapter and verse but they miss the mark. A quote from the Supreme Court ruling in Holy Trinity Church v. United States in 1892 best explains this confusion most people seem to have. The quote is: AIt is a familiar rule that a thing may be within the letter of the statute and yet not within the statute, because not within its spirit nor within the intention of its makers.@ This point is loudly played out in the coming pages. This well aged case law has been ignored throughout all of the legal proceedings used to steal a retirement.
Over the years this confusion has caused great consternation with the author in his dealings with other people of other disciplines and other walks of life. Only through the life long study of Awhy@ has the root cause of these problems become apparent.
This book has been written and hopes to absolve the root cause of these problems.
Whether the people choose or choose not to absolve themselves is between themselves and their Maker, whomever they think that Maker may be.
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