Will His Real Estate Deals Finish Off John Wiley Price and a Blast From the Past

My head is still swimming after reading Jim Schutze’s column describing the Dallas Real Estate dealings of John Wiley Price, whose homes, offices, PA, just about everything including his plumbing were raided on Monday by the F.B.I. While we await word on what the Feds have on him, Schutze pulled some property land records that have my head still swimming:

“According to the county land records I’m looking at, Dallas County Commissioner John Wiley Price bought nine acres of land on Grady Niblo Road near Mountain Creek Lake in far southwest Dallas from a man named Wayne White on September 3, 2002. But here’s the curious thing. On that very same day he bought the very same land from his own administrative assistant, Dapheny Fain.”

How can you buy the same piece of property twice in the same day? Well, he could have bought the land in the morning from the guy he bought it from, Wayne White, then sold it at noon to Madame X, who sold it at two to another buyer, then Price buys it back again from the last buyer at four p.m. Along the way in the course of a day the price of the land appreciates, IJS. I’m not saying this happened, of course, but just speculating and explaining how a flip works. Most interesting though is the blast from the past, how the name Danny Faulkner has emerged in this story, he being the king of real estate flippers. I always wondered what happened to Danny and I think of him every time I drive east on I-30. Faulkner, says Schutze, “was released from prison in 1998 suffering from what was supposed to have been inoperable brain cancer, now in remission. He had served three years and 11 months of a 20-year federal sentence for stealing $100 million from five savings and loans.”

And now he’s found Jesus, I guess.

Anyhow, I am already lining up the RE attorneys to help me understand this case. But when I saw the report on Price’s $100K cash stash in his home,it brought back deja vue of another colorful Dallas real estate investor/character who also had wads of cash stuffed in a home safe over there on Lakemont in Preston Hollow: Nicky Sheets.

Nicky's safe