The Ramblings of a Title Man

Land Title Folklore: Strawmen and Landlords

I titled this Ramblings, “Land Title Folklore” because in true folklore fashion, the information I have on this topic has been passed down in oral tradition from my grandfather to my father to me. This is the story of the rough and tumble world of the 1930s landlords and some of the tactics they would use to be heavy-handed with tenants.

In the 1930s and early 1940s, my grandfather had a customer who owned many single-family homes in St. Louis County, Missouri. He was an Italian immigrant named Niccolo Santelli. He bought and sold real estate on a regular basis, but very strangely – he never put title in his own name. Instead, he used a series of strawmen names for his property.

McCune Gill, Vice President of Title Insurance Corporation of St. Louis, wrote this on the subject of strawmen in 1942:

“Many parcels of real estate, and many deeds of trust, are held in the names of strawmen or strawwomen, or by straw corporations. That is, the record title is held by some individual or corporation that has no actual interest in the property or mortgage but is a mere figure man of straw, a dummy, cloak, figurehead, conduit, intermediary, title holder, nominee, or trustee, for the real owner or owners. Usually, the strawman is an actual person but sometimes it is only imaginary, a mere ghost or alias of the real owner.”

This was the case for Mr. Santelli. He held his properties in the name, “Joseph Albert”. There was no such person named Joseph Albert in St. Louis at this time, the name was only imaginary. The address he used for the grantee’s name on any deed was an address that did not exist on Olive Street, with a street number that would have been in the Mississippi river. Mr. Santelli knew the properties he owned, and he paid his real estate taxes in cash when due. He also collected rent in person from his tenants, and only took cash. He was completely hidden from the Internal Revenue Service. He paid no state or federal income tax, and as far as his tenants knew, they were paying their rent to this imaginary Joseph Albert.

The scheme to hide assets had several additional benefits for Mr. Santelli. First, no one could sue his fictious name title holder. The known address for this imaginary person didn’t exist, and there was no way to get service of process on this person. That had a unique advantage for Mr. Santelli, as he was known as somewhat tenacious about rent. If you paid your rent timely, he took care of the property and was responsive to tenants. If you didn’t, he would show up a few days after the first of the month and remove the front door of the property. Sometimes he would turn off the power if the home had an external master power switch he could lock with a pad lock. Most tenants would quickly pay the rent or move out.?

When he wanted to sell one of his properties, Mr. Santelli had a process that would not work in today’s world of verifying the identity of the seller. He would find someone who was out of work or down on their luck to impersonate Joseph Albert. Mr. Santelli would show up at the closing and have this person profess that they were Joseph Albert. Title companies did not check IDs as they do today, copy machines were not invented until 1938, and most title companies did not have them until the 1950s. The closing would happen, the person who said they were Joseph Albert would sign the deed and receive a check. Mr. Santelli would then have the imposter Joseph Albert sign the back of the seller proceeds check to ‘cash.’ Niccolo Santelli would pay the so-called Mr. Albert a small fee and take his endorsed check to the bank to convert it to cash, and no one would know he ever owned the property.?

In using a strawman, the St. Louis Health Department could never enforce ordinances to maintain tenant properties. Tenants could never sue the true owner, and when they dealt with Mr. Santelli, they thought he was the property manager.?

I have always wondered over the years, as I have thought back on this story from my grandfather, if Niccolo Santelli was part of some organized crime syndicate. Apparently, he never mortgaged his properties, so where did he get his money? Was he laundering money for the St. Louis mob at the time? I do not know the answer.? This kind of scheme would not be possible today, but it is very interesting what you can do with real estate titles.

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“Strawmen” pamphlet written by McCune Gill, published by Title Insurance Corporation of St. Louis, 1942

The name Niccolo Santelli and Joseph Albert are not the real names used by this case, but have been changed by the author as to hide the real names of the parties.