ROCHESTER, N.Y. — Imagine going to Florida for a couple of months in the winter. When you return home you find someone broke into your house and is living there. It’s called squatting. 

New York law says you can’t just kick the squatter out of your house. It’s become such a huge problem, lawmakers on both sides of the aisle want something done.

News10NBC spoke with a couple that just bought a house, but can’t move in.

Zack Alford has had enough. The trash littering the floor of his new home isn’t the half of it. But what’s even more troubling is the damage Zack says he finds daily.

There’s damage from floor to ceiling, and there’s little he can do about it.

That’s because a man, Mike Priestley, is living in Zack’s new house. Public records indicate Priestley has a lengthy list of felony convictions over the last two decades — including assault, drugs, forgery, and promoting sexual performance by a child. 

That one landed him on the sex offender registry — level 2. Priestley is living in Zack’s house rent-free. And the law allows it.

Zack Alford, homeowner: “Nothing I can do. When he destroys the inside of the house, there’s still nothing I can do. Every cop tells me that it’s civil.”

That means Zack has to take the case to court, file an eviction order, and wait for a hearing. 

It’s all especially painful for Zack because this was once his grandparents’ house. His uncle inherited it in 2016, and Zack’s dad, Bob Alford, lived here. Zack recounts when his dad was contacted by a friend, Mike Priestley.

Zach: “He came to him and was crying, and said he had nowhere to go. And my dad felt sorry for him and he said ‘Yeah, you can come here and stay here for a few nights.'”

That was in November. But a few nights turned into a few weeks. According to Zack, Bob was ready to kick Priestley to the curb, but he didn’t get the chance.  

Bob Alford died in a car crash on December third.

Winter turned to spring, spring to summer, and Mike Priestley is still living in that house.

Zack: “I knew that this house had tax issues. So, I contacted my uncle and said, ‘Hey, if I paid the taxes, can we work out a deal?’ And sure enough, he said yes.”

Zack and his wife scraped together more than $13,000 to pay the back taxes and his uncle signed the deed over to Zack.

Zack: “Now it’s my property, and now I’m stuck with this squatter.”

In a lengthy phone call with Priestley, he told News10NBC’s Deanna Dewberry he’s not a squatter — insisting that at one time he did pay rent, and he has receipts to prove it.

Deanna Dewberry, News10NBC: “If you have receipts, just take a picture of it and text it to me.”

He told Deanna he can’t, and he left the receipts at his mother’s house.

Deanna: “So, you’re too busy to go to your mother’s house and take pictures of the receipts?”

That drug paraphernalia our cameras captured in the house? Priestley said he’s never seen it and accused Zack of putting it there.

Assembly member Jake Blumencranz: “We have to ask the question, ‘Is this individual a squatter?’ And it seems like there is some conflict there, and the judge will have to make that determination.”

Assembly member Blumencranz is sponsoring legislation that would protect property owners from squatters. Part of his measure was adopted in the legislature’s budget bill passed in April.

Blumencranz: “What we’ve done here is make it as clear as possible who is and is not a squatter, and the judge can very simply make that determination. In the past there was no term ‘squatter’ within New York State law.”

Which meant that anyone who lived in a home for 30 days, even if they broke in, could claim residency and had to be afforded all the protections of a tenant. Evicting a squatter could take years. New York law now makes clear that squatters are not tenants, and the eviction process should be much faster.

Under the new law, a squatter is defined as a person who enters property without permission and continues to occupy the property without permission.

Here’s where this case gets tricky: all agree that Priestley initially had permission. Even if he never paid rent, he has established residency. Therefore, under New York law, he’s not trespassing. Here’s the irony: Mike Priestley’s criminal past helped him establish residency.

He listed Bob Alford’s address as his own on the New York Sex Offender Registry.

As for Zack… he’s languishing in legal limbo.

“We have our first house. And to not be able to go in there, to not be able to bring the kids in there, not to have them see their rooms to choose their colors,” says Zack.

That will have to wait. For now, Zachary Alford is a homeowner without a home.

Republican New York Assemblymember Blumbencranz as well Democrat State Senator Jessica Scarcella-Spanton have introduced bills making squatting a form of trespassing. Calling squatting a crime would allow police to remove them from the property.

Until then, homeowners and landlords have to take the matter to Civil Court, hoping the wheels of justice move quickly.