A foreclosure auction has been scheduled for a $600,000 house belonging to a Georgia man who died last year. His family says a squatter has taken over the home. Squatting has become an increasing problem in Georgia, authorities have said.
A Georgia family is desperately trying to evict a man who they say has taken over the $600,000 home of their dead patriarch, who passed away last year. The house, which is currently in foreclosure, is scheduled for bank auction on May 7.
Relatives of the deceased homeowner say a man showed up at the empty house last week with a U-Haul trailer, broke into a back door and had the lock changed. Now, the alleged squatter won't leave, the family says.
"I've never seen anything so brazen," Brittany Peterson tells Inside Edition Digital. "The police were there all day yesterday, banging on the door and he wouldn't open it," she says.
Peterson is the daughter-in-law of Michael Peterson, who died in June 2023. He built the Powder Springs home himself and he and his wife raised five children there, including Brittany's husband, Alexander.
The patriarch had just been through an expensive divorce before his death, and the five-bedroom, four-bath house had two liens against it and a second mortgage, Brittany Peterson says. So the family made the difficult decision to let the large home go into foreclosure.
In the past week or so, notices about the impending bank auction began appearing in online real estate sites, including Zillow and Redfin, Brittany Peterson says. Then the alleged squatter showed up, she tells Inside Edition Digital.
The man claimed to have a lease for the home, she says. "He said a woman came up to him in Home Depot and offered him a lease to make repairs to the home in exchange for living there," Peterson says. None of that is true, the family says.
Police are investigating, according to a statement released by the Cobb County Police Department.
"This investigation has been forwarded to our Criminal Investigative Unit for further investigation. The investigation into this matter is still ongoing and no charges have been filed at this time," the statement said.
Inside Edition Digital reached out for comment to the department, but has not heard back.
Squatting has become an increasing problem in Georgia, especially in the greater Atlanta area, authorities have said.
A bill was signed this week by Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp that makes squatting a misdemeanor crime and speeds up the legal process to remove squatters from a home. Presenting a lease that proves to be forged is now a felony, under the new law.
Peterson says she hopes the new law will help her family.
"It's pretty mind-blowing," she says. "So many people have reached out to me saying it's happened to them."
Other states, including New York, have recently enacted laws seeking to oust squatters after multiple cases emerged of homeowners claiming their properties have been overrun by squatters who have falsely sublet their homes. In some instances, squatters have allegedly stripped homes of expensive pipes and appliances. And in the 2023 case of one Georgia house outside Atlanta, turned the residence into an illegal strip club where neighbors complained of gunshots, loud music and live horses on the lawn, according to Fulton County authorities.
"One way or another, it's going to come to a close," Peterson says, noting the house is still scheduled to be auctioned on May 7 by the mortgage bank.
She worries about what the interior of the nearly 3,000-square-foot home looks like now. No one has been able to get inside the house since the stranger moved in, she says.
"It's the craziest thing I've ever seen," she says. It's also been hard on the surviving children who grew up in that house.
"It's been heartbreaking to all of them," she says. "I just hope that other people don't have to go through this."
Related Stories
