How Pollution Can Be Your Real Estate Ally

Every year thousands of Americans face the same daunting task–dealing with an inherited house after their last parent dies. If the house is somewhere with a healthy real estate market, moving the house is fairly easy. But what if it’s in a struggling area, perhaps somewhere where the economy has been reduced to one huge poultry plant and an even bigger Wal-Mart?

That house can take years to sell. In the meantime you and your siblings pay for the taxes and upkeep. You could rent it, which is a pain. Especially after you see the house on the six-o’clock news, engulfed in flames under a headline blaring “Suspected Meth Lab In Fredsville!”

Fortunately for you, China is choking on pollution. Which is a bummer for moms. Imagine facing a wide-eyed Junior and having to say “You want to go to a park? Outside? Yeah, right.”

That crap must get old.

So, Chinese women (and others) come to the US under the guise of vacationing and have their children born in the US, which makes them citizens. Then they go home, planning to return at some date. You can’t blame a parent for wanting the next generation to be able to breathe.

For you, the time-strapped inheritor struggling to move a home, this “maternity tourism” is a godsend. In an article I read about the practice I saw the four golden words beloved by Wall Street Executives and payday lenders everywhere — “It isn’t necessarily illegal.”

I don’t know how you sell a house to the guys running these maternity scams. But I do know this — the customers pay a lot for their “vacations.” Which means you can sell that house for a good price because no one involved gives a damn about how good the schools are.

Don’t feel bad doing this. Politicians sold out your Mom’s town by helping the factory owners there find cheaper labor in places like China. So you’re just jumping on the China Gravy Train like the Big Business guys did.

I see a Ted Talk in my future with this one.