In China, they're known as "nail houses" -- homes where owners refuse to accept compensation offered by road builders and developers in exchange for the demolition of their property. The dwellings stand like a nail that refuses to be hammered down -- a not uncommon phenomenon as some homeowners resist dispossession of their land or hold out for more money.

1.A nail house sits in the middle of a road under construction in Nanning in April 2015. The owner of the house didn’t reach an agreement with the local authority about compensation for the demolition. Photograph: China Stringer Network/Reuters
Photograph: China Stringer Network/Reuters

2. A nail house at a crossroads in Pinghe in China’s south-eastern Fujian province in November 2013. The local government has demolished most of the two-storey block, but one apartment owner has refused to move. Now only a tiny sliver of building remains. Photograph: HAP/Quirky China News/Rex

3. A lone resident holds out against luxury villas in Suzhou, Jiangsu province, in July 2013. Photograph: HAP/Quirky China News/REX

4. Zheng Meiju outside her nail house in Rui’an, Zhejiang province, in July 2013. She has been living in the partially demolished home for nearly a year, even though the water and electricity supply were cut. Photograph: China Stringer Network/Reuters

5. Nail houses isolated by man-made ditches on a construction site in Yangji village in Guangzhou last year. The ditches were dug by relocated residents, forcing those remaining to move out. Photograph: Liu jiao/Imaginechina/AFP

6.
Perhaps the most famous nail house is this one left stranded in the middle of a road in Wenling, in Zhejiang province. An elderly couple refused to sign an agreement to allow their house to be demolished. Photograph: China Daily/Reuters

7.
A six-floor apartment block on a construction site in Shenzhen in 2007. Owner Choi Chu Cheung and his wife Zhang Lian-hao refused to accept the compensation offered by the developer. Photograph: Paul Yeung/Reuters


http://edition.cnn.com/2015/05/19/asia/gallery/china-nail-houses/

Post more pictures naw.

8. On March 13, this famous holdout is going up on the auction block. When the Ballard Blocks mall was coming into Seattle's Ballard neighborhood in 2005, owner Edith Macefield refused an offer of nearly $1 million for her modest 1,000-square-foot, century-old house.

It may have inspired the Pixar movie "Up." As a promotion in 2009, Pixar parent Disney outfitted the house with a bundle of balloons like in the movie.

Something of a folk hero, Macefield died in her own home at age 86 in 2008, but willed the house to Barry Martin, the superintendent on the construction site, who had gradually become her friend and caretaker. Martin sold the house to Reach Returns, a group which had plans to elevate the house but keep it intact, but the property fell into foreclosure. The surrounding mall was designed to eventually overtake the space so if the owner of the mall buys the property, it's not looking good for this little wood house that could.

Reminds me of what I watched on tv some years back. This duplex owner refused compensation. On the day they came to demolished their house,the stubborn man and his family were still in their home with their properties still intact. When they noticed that the bulldozer was seriously moving towards their house,they started throwing their properties down from the balcony Eventually,their house was destroyed with most of their properties

It happened here in nigeria. So I agree with the poster above.

These occur when the govt is aware that you have a right and they can only persuade you.

Some folks sha I don't think its a wise decision. Y not take wat dy offer and move?

somcherry:
Reminds me of what I watched on tv some years back. This duplex owner refused compensation. On the day they came to demolished their house,the stubborn man and his family were still in their home with their properties still intact. When they noticed that the bulldozer was seriously moving towards their house,they started throwing their properties down from the balcony Eventually,their house was destroyed with most of their properties

It happened here in nigeria. So I agree with the poster above.

lwkmd

[size=30pt]Nigeria is not of this world. [/size]