Scranton couple's dream home turns into nightmare

Oct. 12—SCRANTON — A city couple's dream of home ownership turned into a nightmare when a crumbling foundation forced them to move out and led to the condemnation of the house.

Chris Henehan and his wife, Lori Greenwood-Henehan, moved out of their home at 734 Theodore St. in North Scranton in early 2018 because of water infiltration undermining the stone-block foundation and causing toxic mold. In May 2021, the city condemned the home as "unfit for human occupancy" because, by then, part of the crumbling foundation had a gaping hole into the basement.

Now, the couple faces losing their home for good under a sheriff's sale Friday in Lackawanna County Court, according to public notices in The Times-Tribune.

"It's a very hard pill to swallow," Lori Greenwood-Henehan said.

Chris Henehan said, "That's your dream, to raise a family in your home and to have a home. And I had a dream and it's gone."

The couple were in their early 20s with a growing family when they bought the home in 1999. They believe it was the first home built in the Electric City Park subdivision in 1892. Narrow and long with high ceilings and original interior wood features, the two-story home with a full attic fit them well.

They scrimped and saved to buy the house and make it a home. A union electrician who at that time was an apprentice, Chris Henehan pumped gas on weekends and was a bouncer at the former Tink's bar, while Lori Greenwood-Henehan worked various jobs. Family members offered financial help.

"And we said, 'No. We want to do this on our own,' because that's the pride we had and wanting to have our family and to have a home," Chris Henehan said.

They raised their three sons, John, 28, Christopher, 26, and Corey, 22, there. They took pride in improving the home over the years, by installing a modern kitchen and decorative stone on the front porch facade.

But around 2017, they started noticing rainwater getting into the basement. The situation rapidly worsened and compromised the foundation. They believe several factors were at play, including neighboring tree roots that poked into the foundation and gutter downspouts that directed rainwater toward their foundation, and with the drainage seeping into old mines underneath the home causing a subsidence and the house to sink and shift.

Mold grew in the basement and spores spread upstairs. One day, Lori Greenwood-Henehan went to the basement, turned on the light and saw a bevy of red mushrooms in dank mud.

"I almost had a heart attack. I felt like I was on another planet," she said. "I have never seen anything like it."

Chris Henehan tried to fix things. He installed a steel-pole column in the basement for support and sprayed walls with bleach to kill mold spores. He shoveled out mud that accumulated in the basement from storms into five-gallon buckets and dumped it in the backyard. But they couldn't keep up with it all as the foundation worsened.

In 2018, a remediation firm advised them to leave the house immediately. Lori Greenwood-Henehan and Corey, who was still living home, left first, followed by Chris Henehan four months later. They left all of their belongings behind, because taking anything with them would require disinfection to ensure they wouldn't transport mold spores to their new dwelling — a home on Oak Street rented from a family member.

Their home insurance company, Amco Insurance Co., doing business as Nationwide Mutual Insurance Co., denied coverage of foundation damage, claiming it occurred from "act of God," according to court papers in a lawsuit the couple filed against the insurer, the city and an old coal company, Penn Anthracite Colliers Co.The lawsuit, initiated in November 2021 in Lackawanna County Court, was transferred earlier this year to federal court, where it remains pending. The insurer and city filed motions to dismiss the lawsuit. City solicitor Jessica Eskra said the city no longer is a defendant in the case. An amended lawsuit filed in May no longer includes the city as a defendant.It was unclear if the old coal company long ago became defunct. Efforts to reach the insurer's attorney or coal company were unsuccessful.

As the Henehans could not afford to pay both the mortgage at 734 Theodore St. and the rent on Oak Street, they stopped paying the mortgage. With the house condemned, they could not possibly live there or even go inside.

The Henehans have continued to pay the property taxes on the home, Lori Greenwood-Henehan said.

A bank instituted mortgage foreclosure proceedings that will result in a sheriff's sale Friday at the county courthouse. The amount sought in the sheriff's sale is $68,059.

The Henehans always hoped they would get back into their Theodore Street home. "We thought that we were just coming here (to Oak Street) temporarily. Clearly, that was not the case," Lori Greenwood-Henehan said.

Meanwhile, they worry that 734 Theodore St. could collapse.

"That's all I've been thinking. It has kept me up so many nights. I've had nightmares," she said. "I don't even know how the house is still standing right now, to be honest with you. But if that house lets loose, that foundation, I'm just scared to death that it could be catastrophic. That's really my biggest fear."

Contact the writer:

jlockwood@timesshamrock.com; 570-348-9100 x5185; @jlockwoodTT on Twitter.