Portfolio summary · Sub-grade assets · FY 2026
The dungeons
Brian calls them the dungeons. On every document they are what they are:
garden-level units and unfinished basements, eleven of them, held across Florida,
Texas, and the home parcel in Mid-Lotion, Virginia. Nothing above grade. Nothing ever
above grade. The portfolio has never had a vacancy and has never had a survey it liked.
Portfolio schedule — as of the first of the month
Prepared by Brian · Reviewed by nobody
11Sub-grade assets under management
0Above-grade structures owned, ever
3States, if Florida and Virginia are separate, which is now in dispute
367Petitions filed to correct one word
Land records · Parcel 1659-B · Name of record
Mid-Lotion, Virginia
The home parcel was recorded in 1659 by a clerk who was in a hurry. The hand slipped
once, in the middle of one word, and that word has been the legal name of the property
for three hundred and sixty-seven years. Brian has petitioned the county three hundred
and sixty-seven times. The county has answered three hundred and sixty-seven times.
Legally binding · The county
Mid-Lotion
The deed, the tax bill, the title binder, the water statement, the road sign, and
the receipt for the fee Brian pays to ask them to change it. Hyphen mandatory.
The county has confirmed in writing that the hyphen is “the correct part.”
Actual · Brian, alone
Midlothian
Used on his business cards, his voicemail greeting, and nowhere else in recorded
history. The print shop asked him twice if he was sure. He said yes both times.
He was right both times. It has never once been accepted by a person or a machine.
Doctrinal · Ownership
Midloathian
The coven’s spelling, used in all 367 years of HOA minutes without a single
deviation. They maintain it is the original and that the other two are corruptions.
Their stated basis is that it is “more accurate to the vibe.”
Three spellings. None of them mine, except the one nobody uses. — B.
Exhibit A · The same parcel · Ten documents
How it is spelled, by whom
Compiled for the 367th petition. The county reviewed this exhibit and returned it with a
note saying the exhibit itself proved their point, which it does.
Correspondence · Received the 5th · Framed the 6th
The letter he framed
The most recent one. It is identical to the other 366 except for a word at the end.
Office of the Clerk of Circuit Court — Land Records Division
Re: Petition 367 · Correction of recorded parcel name · Parcel 1659-B, Mid-Lotion
The County is in receipt of your petition to amend the recorded name of the
above-referenced parcel from Mid-Lotion to Midlothian.
The petition is denied.
The recorded name has been in continuous, uninterrupted, and undisputed use since
1659. The County finds no evidence of clerical error. A name used for three hundred
and sixty-seven years is not a mistake. It is a name.
Your exhibit demonstrating that ten separate issuing bodies spell the parcel four
different ways has been reviewed. The County notes that eight of the ten agree with
the County, and considers the matter settled on the weight of the majority.
This determination is final. This determination has been final on three hundred and
sixty-six previous occasions. The filing fee is non-refundable and has been applied
to an account styled MID-LOTION, which the County notes you also disputed.
Yours,
D. Pettigrew · Deputy Clerk · Land Records
She wrote “yours” at the end. She did not have to write “yours.”
Framed it. Hung it beside the other 366. Filing 368 on Monday. — B.
Memorandum from Ownership
To: Property Manager · From: Ownership (also the tenants) · Re: The name, again
Ownership has reviewed the County’s determination and rejects it. Ownership has
also reviewed the Property Manager’s proposed correction and rejects that as well.
The correct spelling is Midloathian. It has always been Midloathian.
Ownership was present at the recording in 1659, remembers the clerk’s hand
perfectly well, and notes that he was hurrying because he had somewhere to be, and
that where he had to be was here.
The middle portion of the word is doctrinal and will not be revised for the
convenience of a highway sign. Ownership will not be litigating this. Ownership will
simply continue writing it correctly for another three hundred and sixty-seven years,
which Ownership notes it is well positioned to do.
Motion to adopt the County spelling: failed 12–0. Motion to adopt the Property
Manager’s spelling: failed 12–0. Motion to thank the Property Manager for
continuing to try: carried unanimously, with feeling.
Twelve to nothing, twice, and then they clapped. — B.
Petition log · 1659 – present · Abridged
Three hundred and sixty-seven attempts
Selected entries from the correction file. The file is kept in the garden level of the
home parcel, in a drawer, in a room that is on no plan.
1659
Deed recorded. The clerk’s hand slips once, in the middle of one word. The parcel enters the permanent record as Mid-Lotion. He apologizes, says he will fix it Monday, and goes home. Monday is not a thing that happens to that document.
1661
Petition 1. Denied. Stated reason: “the record is the record.” This remains, verbatim, the stated reason on all 367 denials.
1704
Ownership begins spelling it Midloathian in the minutes “as a corrective.” Motion to standardize on one spelling fails 11–1. The one is Brian.
1804
Petition 14. The county requires production of the original deed. Brian produces the original deed. The county reads the original deed, observes that it says Mid-Lotion, and denies the petition on the strength of the error itself.
1889
Petition 33. A new clerk. The new clerk is sympathetic. The new clerk says he sees the problem and will look into it. The new clerk retires that Friday. Brian does not blame him. Brian thinks about him a lot.
1961
The highway division erects a route sign. Brian is consulted by telephone and spells the name aloud, letter by letter, twice. The sign reads MID-LOTION. He has never asked what happened.
1987
A $40 filing fee is introduced for name-correction petitions. Brian pays it. The receipt is issued to Mid-Lotion. He pays it again the next year. He has now paid it thirty-nine consecutive times.
2003
The county digitizes 367 years of land records. The error is now searchable, indexed, and instant. Petition 348 is denied by email in under four minutes, which is the fastest the county has ever moved on anything.
2019
Petition 364 denied. New language appears in the denial for the first time since 1661: “consistent historical usage.” Brian reads this as progress. It is not progress.
2026
Petition 367 denied. Deputy Clerk D. Pettigrew no longer mails the denial. She brings it out to the counter herself, hands it over, and says it is nice to see him. She is 69. She is married. Her husband’s name has not been established and Brian has decided not to establish it.
Listing sheets · Fifteen sheets, eleven of record · None marketed
The portfolio
Cap rates are as reported. Reported by whom is a question the portfolio does not answer.
Inspection findings are Brian’s, in ballpoint, written on a stair in every case
except one, where there was no stair.
Mid-Lotion, Virginia Home base · 3 assets
Mid-Lotion, VA · Parcel 1659-B
The Original — Garden Level
- Asset type
- Garden-level unit, beneath the leasing office
- Net rentable
- 1,659 sq ft
- Cap rate
- 16.59%
- Occupancy
- 100%, since before occupancy was measured
- Ceiling
- 6 ft 2 in.
Inspection finding
The original. Every other dungeon in the portfolio is a copy of this one, down to the smell, which I have never been able to source and no longer try to.
Cap rate was derived from the parcel number, which is not how that works, by a woman who was not going to be argued with. Ceiling is 6′2″. I am 6′1″. That was not an accident and I have stopped pretending it was. — B.
HeldHeld since 1659 · Never listed
Mid-Lotion
Mid-Lotion, VA · Adjacent to county records
Coalfield Terrace — Sub-Grade G
- Asset type
- Unfinished basement, party wall
- Net rentable
- 880 sq ft
- Cap rate
- 6.9%
- Occupancy
- 100%
- Shares a wall with
- County Records Annex, Room 4
Inspection finding
East wall is shared with the county records annex. You can hear the clerks filing. On a quiet afternoon you can hear them file something as Mid-Lotion, and then another thing, and then another thing.
I put a chair down there. I sit in the chair. I listen to my own address be wrong at roughly forty documents an hour. Structurally the wall is fine. — B.
OccupiedAmenities: the wall
Mid-Lotion, VA · Assessed as a shed
Hull Street — Garden Levels 1–3
- Asset type
- Garden-level unit, three sub-grade floors
- Net rentable
- 4,100 sq ft
- Assessed as
- Shed — condition: fair
- Assessed value
- $400
- Cap rate
- 1,659% on assessed value
Inspection finding
Three sub-grade floors, forty-one hundred square feet, a working service elevator, and its own mailing address. The assessor’s card says SHED — FAIR.
Forty-one appeals filed. Zero heard. It is the same office that will not spell it right, and it is the same desk, and it is the same person, and she is lovely. — B.
OpenAppeals filed: 41 · Appeals heard: 0
Shed
Florida 6 sheets · 4 of record · All below grade · Two below sea level
Cape Coral, FL · Elevation negative
Manatee Bend — Garden Level 1
- Asset type
- Garden-level unit
- Elevation
- −4 ft, falling
- Rate of descent
- 1.9 in./yr, accelerating
- Cap rate
- 9.4%, annualized, before sinking
- Occupancy
- 100%
Inspection finding
Unit was at grade in 1998. Unit is now four feet below it. Nothing has been excavated. Nobody has dug. The unit is doing this by itself and the tenants describe the process as “settling in.”
At the current rate it becomes the second story of something else by 2071. Reclassified as garden level, provisional. The insurer is aware and has stopped writing back. — B.
OpenFlood zone: yes · Flood zone tier: new
Settling
Boca Raton, FL · HOA-governed
Flamingo Reach — Sub-Level B
- Asset type
- Unfinished basement, in Florida
- Net rentable
- 1,240 sq ft
- Cap rate
- 4.1% after assessments
- Occupancy
- 100%
- Governing body
- Flamingo Reach Community Association
Inspection finding
Florida is not supposed to have basements. This one predates the association and the association cannot forgive it. Eleven members. They meet twice a week, on purpose.
They have banned beige, wind chimes, visible hoses, and the concept of a screen door. I have sat in a coven meeting that has run 367 years and I have sat in a Flamingo Reach meeting that ran ninety minutes. I know which one I would go back to. — B.
ContestedFines YTD: $4,140 · Fines paid: $0
Wakulla County, FL · Bog-adjacent
Sumpwater Landing — Cellar
- Asset type
- Cellar, partially submerged, by design
- Net rentable
- Varies with the tide
- Cap rate
- Withheld pending survey
- Occupancy
- 100%
- Jurisdiction
- Unresolved
Inspection finding
A hydrologist confirms that this swamp and the Virginia bog are the same body of water. Not connected. The same. Nine hundred miles apart and it is one bog, and he was very calm about it, and then he left.
If it is one parcel, this Florida asset is in Virginia, or Virginia is in Florida, and either way somebody owes somebody 367 years of transfer tax. I completed the report. I filed the report. I filed it in a drawer. — B.
Do not fileSurvey ordered 1974 · Survey status: pending
One Bog
Yeehaw Junction, FL · Never visited
00 Nowhere Grade — Believed Garden Level
- Asset type
- Believed garden level
- Net rentable
- Self-reported
- Cap rate
- 12.0%, self-reported by the property
- Occupancy
- 100%
- Site visits
- 0 in 115 years
Inspection finding
Acquired 1911. The address does not resolve. Not to a map, not to the plat, not to a person at the counter. I have driven down four times and arrived somewhere else each time. One of those times was a Wendy’s.
It pays on the first, in full, and the check clears. I have stopped driving down. It knows I stopped. The rent went up on its own to reflect that. — B.
FiledDo not investigate
Punta Gorda, FL · Forty-one named storms
Peace River — Sub-Grade 1
- Asset type
- Unfinished basement, coastal
- Net rentable
- 1,180 sq ft
- Cap rate
- 5.9%, uninsurable
- Occupancy
- 100%
- Water taken
- None. Not once.
Inspection finding
Forty-one named storms have crossed this parcel since we took it and not one of them has put water in this basement. The street floods. The lot floods. The four steps down to the door flood. The room is dry.
Three carriers have declined to write it and all three cited the absence of a claims history, which they treated as the problem. I have stopped explaining it and started keeping towels down there for the neighbours. — B.
UninsuredNot on the schedule · Claims filed: 0
Ochopee, FL · Conveyed 2004, unmentioned
Tamiami — The Included Cellar
- Asset type
- Cellar, conveyed with something else
- Net rentable
- 900 sq ft
- Cap rate
- Not calculated. It was free.
- Occupancy
- 100%, at closing, already
- Consideration
- $0 — three words
Inspection finding
The legal description on a 2004 closing ended with the words “and the cellar.” Nobody at that table mentioned the cellar. I read the description aloud in full, because I read the description aloud in full, and everybody waited politely until I had finished.
There is a cellar. There is a tenant in the cellar. Her lease is dated 1931, it is a better lease than the one I would have drawn her, and she pays on the first. — B.
HeldNever added to the schedule · Rent: current
And The Cellar
Texas 6 sheets · 4 of record · One oversize · One spelled correctly
Waxahachie, TX · Variance granted
Ellis County — Garden Level
- Asset type
- Unfinished basement, oversize
- Net rentable
- 41,200 sq ft
- Statutory maximum
- 40,000 sq ft
- Cap rate
- 3.0% — the variance was expensive
- Occupancy
- 100%
Inspection finding
The basement exceeded the maximum permitted sub-grade area for the county by twelve hundred square feet. We applied for a variance. The hearing ran six hours and nine people testified. Three of them were Geralds.
Variance granted, unanimously, at 1:40 in the morning. The basement has since grown another eight hundred square feet. I am not reapplying. — B.
ApprovedVariance TX-1659 · Expires: never
Variance
Midlothian, TX · Spelled correctly
Midlothian Commons — Cellar Level
- Asset type
- Storm-rated cellar
- Net rentable
- 2,600 sq ft
- Cap rate
- 8.0%
- Occupancy
- 100%
- Reason for acquisition
- Spite
Inspection finding
There is a Midlothian in Texas. It is spelled correctly. Every sign, every tax bill, every utility statement, the water tower, the high school, the sign on the water tower at the high school. Correctly. Purchased 1961.
I brought a photograph of the water tower to the Virginia county office and set it on the counter. She looked at it for a long time. She said, “That’s Texas.” She is 69. She is married. — B.
HeldAcquired 1961 · Visited: constantly
Spelled Right
Muleshoe, TX · Unimproved
Route 3 — Cellar, No Structure
- Asset type
- Storm cellar
- Improvements
- One mailbox
- Above-grade structure
- None. Never any.
- Cap rate
- 69% — there are no expenses
- Occupancy
- 100%
Inspection finding
There is no house. There has never been a house. There is a set of doors in a field, a set of stairs, one room, and a mailbox at the road with a number on it that the post office honors without comment.
It receives mail. It receives a great deal of mail. Highest-performing asset in the portfolio and the only one I can describe to a stranger in one sentence. — B.
ClosedOperating expenses: $0 · Mail volume: heavy
Marfa, TX · Vacated 1978
High Lonesome — Basement Unit 2
- Asset type
- Unfinished basement
- Net rentable
- 640 sq ft
- Cap rate
- 0.0%
- Occupancy
- 0% · rent current
- Prior tenant
- Vacated 1978, no forwarding address
Inspection finding
Note left on the bottom stair, in pencil, on the back of a rent receipt. It reads, in full: “I fixed the light. Don’t fix the light back.”
The light is fixed. I do not know what it was before. I have not fixed it back and I am not going to. Unit shows well. Unit will not be shown. — B.
No actionRent: current · Tenant: gone
Don’t
Cut and Shoot, TX · On the county shelter map
Pinehill — Storm Cellar, Public
- Asset type
- Storm cellar, designated shelter
- Net rentable
- 1,900 sq ft
- Cap rate
- 0.0% — there is no rent
- Occupancy
- 0%, except twice a year
- Seating
- Twenty-two folding chairs
Inspection finding
The county put this cellar on the severe-weather map in 1971 without asking me and I have never once asked them to take it off. When the sirens go, the road comes down the steps, and there is somewhere for the road to sit down.
Twenty-two chairs, stacked, levelled, wiped down in March. Used eleven times in fifty-five years. It earns nothing at all and it is the best thing on this list. — B.
HeldRent collected: none, ever · Not on the schedule
Mentone, TX · The only one in the county
Loving County — Basement
- Asset type
- Unfinished basement
- Net rentable
- 1,340 sq ft
- Cap rate
- 11.0% — also the county average
- Occupancy
- 100%
- County sub-grade code
- One paragraph. His.
Inspection finding
It is the only basement in the county, which is why the cap rate is also the county-wide average. In 1974 they asked me to write their sub-grade code, because there was nobody else in the county to ask. It runs one paragraph. It says put in a second way out and mean it.
This one and three others are not on the schedule. The schedule says eleven, the ledger says eleven, and I hold fifteen. I have spent three hundred and sixty-seven petitions on one word already and I am not opening a second front over a number. The record is the record. — B.
HeldAssets of record: 11 · Assets: 15
Eleven
Schedule of properties · Eleven assets · Unaudited
The full schedule
Prepared for a lender in 1994. The lender read it, asked three questions, received three
answers, and withdrew. The schedule has been maintained ever since out of habit.
Blended cap rate is 6.9%. I did not choose that. I ran it four times. — B.
Operating metrics · Trailing twelve months
How it is performing
Well. Alarmingly well. That is the finding.
Portfolio metrics — trailing twelve
Source: the drawer
100%Occupancy portfolio-wide, including the one nobody can find
$400Assessed value of a three-level asset the county calls a shed
41Consecutive assessment appeals filed and not heard
1Bogs, total, across two states nine hundred miles apart
Annual inspection · All eleven assets · Single inspector
Findings, in summary
One inspector, one clipboard, eleven properties, four days. The summary page is
reproduced as written, which is to say on a stair.
Annual sub-grade inspection — summary of findings
Inspector: Brian · Credential: none required · Days on site: 4 · Days claimed: 1
- Structural: All eleven sound. Two of them are sound in a way I would describe as eager.
- Egress: Every asset has one more way out than it has on the plan. This has been true at every inspection since 1774 and I have stopped noting which one.
- Moisture: Present at nine. Absent at Marfa, which is drier than the desert it is in. Absent at Muleshoe, which is a hole in a field.
- Mechanical: No asset in the portfolio has a furnace. Every asset in the portfolio is warm.
- Vermin: None. Not one. In eleven basements. Across three states. Somebody has arranged this and I would like to thank them and I do not know who to thank.
- Signage: Nine of eleven assets have their address spelled wrong on at least one permanent fixture. Six of those nine are in Virginia. Three of those six are the same building.
- Recommendation: Hold everything. Sell nothing. Do not survey Wakulla.
Inspection complete. Portfolio is in better shape than the inspector. — B.