Contractors break into wrong house twice

TWENTYNINE PALMS, Calif., Sept. 8 (UPI) -- Contractors mistakenly broke into a California house twice, thinking it was the foreclosed home they had been hired to clean out, a couple say.

To add insult to injury, Alvin and Pat Tjosaas say the house in Twentynine Palms was bought for cash 50 years ago and has never had a mortgage, ABC News reported Thursday. Contractors employed by Wells Fargo twice -- around Memorial Day and then again during the Labor Day weekend -- mistook it for other nearby properties.

The house belonged to Alvin Tjosaas' parents, and he shares ownership with his sisters.

No one had been living in the house, although Alvin Tjosaas, 77, would drive from his home in Woodland Hills, Calif., about 200 miles away, to work on it.

Pat Tjosaas, 75, said Wells Fargo was very apologetic about the double mistake -- "and we appreciate that." But she said some of the items that have disappeared are irreplaceable, including the uniform her father-in-law wore during World War I.

She said once the locks were broken people appear to have been using the house and leaving beer bottles and bongs behind.