The tomato that paid the mortgage

Sage real estate editors and reporters will tell you that any story can be a real estate story. (Witness Peter Viles’ filing last week on that chunky foreclosed-upon cat.)

So it was flipping through “In Praise of Tomatoes” (2004),  by Ronni Lundy, in search of a summer recipe, that I found this tale: Back in the '30s, West Virginia mechanic M.C. Byles cross-bred four hefty varieties to come up with plants that yielded tomatoes averaging 2.5 pounds. Selling the plants for $1 apiece, he was able to pay off his $6,000 mortgage in six years. These heirloom tomatoes, still around and available for purchase, are called Radiator Charlie’s Mortgage Lifters.

Of course it’s unlikely anyone’s mortgage woes today will be solved by a tomato. But who can top that for an unlikely way to pay off a home loan?

-- Lauren Beale

Your thoughts? Comments?
Photo credit: Los Angeles Times

Comments

[E]

Now it's the "mint" growing in the basement that pays the mortgage.

HAHA!

[MyLessThanPrimeBeef]

The irony is if you prospect on your land and strike oil, instead of cross-breeding tomatoes, it won't help you at all to pay off your mortgage, even if oil is @ $200 per barrel.

As a matter of that, you probably have to disclose the on-site oil wells on your listing and warn the buyer of possible cancer risks.

[Diane]

Hey Peter: I have my own little mortgage tomato race happening in my backyard. So far, the Bonny Best and Mortgage Tomato are neck-and-neck: http://www.zillowblog.com/you-say-tomato-i-say-
mortgage-tomato/2008/05/

[The original RZ]

Interesting. I saw the same thing in this month's "Cooking Light" magazine.