The_Toecutter wrote:And it's not just that. It's also the mortgage interest on my mom's house that has been paid thus far exceeding the value of the house, AND all of the fees/regulations/permits required to keep it up and the fact that it is falling apart and not up to code which could cause her to lose it(the city is not going to pay for all of the things it is forcing us to abide by, after all, and could condemn the property if it found out what was wrong with it, and I'm not making nearly enough to fix it and the cost of repairs needed likely matches or exceeds the value of the property).
One thing here is interesting, if I understand it well.
You are writting that the property is "not up to the code".
How so?
When it was built, it had to be up to the code of that time.
Does that mean that once codes are upgraded, owners are forced to upgrade their properties as well?
In Poland you do not need to do it.
If your wiring or building heat insulation is lets say up the code from 1990-ties and property was built at that time according to these codes, you are not obliged to make any upgrades now, even if codes have changed.
You are only obliged to make sure that property is structurally sound and not at risk of collapse.
Is there any difference in the US?
Regarding smartphones going dark.
Who knows, maybe malicious piece of software aka virus will one day clog up or corrupt data transmission networks to the point of making them unusable?
And if this software is advanced AI type and based on morphing codes it may not even be possible to flash it out of the system?