When Marie Riggins moved into her corner lot home in Inglewood with her late husband in 1986, she thought they’d live there forever.
The now 82-year-old widow and her late husband had bought their dream house, which had then been newly built in Inglewood’s Carleton Square gated community.
But the last 10 years have been a nightmare for Riggins, who lost her husband to pancreatic cancer, filed for bankruptcy shortly after, and now may lose her home.
“My blood, sweat and tears are in this house,” said Riggins, who hasn’t retired and continues to work in bookkeeping. “This is my home, this is where I’m going to stay.”
The trouble began in 2017 when she began to fall behind on homeowner association dues. Riggins says her HOA is demanding $38,000 that she allegedly owes.
“There’s no way in the world that I would owe $38,000,” she said. “That meant I never paid my property dues.”
Her home, which sits across from the $5 billion newly built SoFi stadium, is now worth nearly $1 million.
But to Riggins, you can’t put a price tag on her home. It’s where she had made decades of memories and plans to spend the rest of her years.
“I’m not going to stand around here and let them take the home that I worked hard for,” she said.
But Riggins’ home is in foreclosure, and is soon to be owned by the bank.
“I have spent too much money to just say, ‘OK here take it.’ … And there’s no way in the world I can get out of here in a month,” she said, “Where am I supposed to go?”
Riggins says she is now hoping for a minor miracle.
“I’m trying to pay them to get my title back because I don’t plan to move from here. My husband died here. It makes me sick,” she said. “I said they’re going to have to kill me, it’s that bad.”
A GoFundMe has been set up here for anyone would like to help Riggins.
