’99 Homes’ Summary & Ending Explained: Why Did Rick Thank Nash?

’99 Homes’ is a 2014 American drama film directed by Ramin Bahrani. The movie, set in Florida during the Great Recession, revolves around single father Dennis Nash (played by Andrew Garfield) and his family facing eviction from their home by businessman Rick Carver (played by Michael Shannon). To secure his family’s home, Nash makes a difficult choice to assist Carver in the eviction of others. The film explores themes of economic hardship and moral dilemmas. Dedicated to the late film critic Roger Ebert, ’99 Homes’ explores the complex consequences of financial struggles during challenging times. The thing with the ’99 Homes’ is if you side with the homeowners, you are financially illiterate, and if you side with Rick, you are heartless.

This is what makes the movie so difficult to digest but brilliant at the same time, and the movie’s ambiguous ending definitely leaves you to wonder, what happened following the final confrontation?

Dennis is about to lose the house, and he really doesn’t know how to navigate the world of bankers & lawyers

The first character we meet is technically Rick; he is a real estate broker who finally made it big following the 2008 stock market crash. Rick is screwing over people on three fronts; he is buying off houses and making sure that some of the items, appliances, or furniture are missing so he can claim extra money from the insurance and is compensated by the government for it. He regularly evicts people from their houses. It’s just business from him, and the first we see him, he kind of gives off a vibe that he is a heartless monster. His first foreclosure in the movie is accompanied by the suicide of a father who couldn’t bear to see his children homeless.

Next, we have Dennis Nash, he is a single father living with his son, Connor, and his mother. Dennis loaned some money a couple of years prior to the events of the movie; he loaned $ 85,000 dollars against his house to fund his up-and-rising construction company and buy needed tools. But since 2008, the housing market collapsed, and he lost everything. Dennis makes an appearance in court and tries to argue that he just needs more time to pay off the loan, but the judge dismisses him and orders the foreclosure to go through.

Dennis has 30 days to file an appeal, and his lawyer supposedly tells him that he won’t be evicted within those 30 days. However, this turns out to be false as Rick shows up on his doorstep the next day, accompanied by the police officers, and Lynn, Dennis, and Connor have 2 minutes to grab necessities and move out of the house.

The rest of their stuff will be put on the lawn; they have 24 hours to move them elsewhere; otherwise, their stuff will be trashed. Dennis, Connor and Lynn move to the nearby hotel and Dennis promises his son that he will get the house back, he doesn’t know how but he will do it.

Rick gives Dennis a job

The next day, Dennis is moving what he can from their foreclosed house when he notices that the men who were moving their stuff from the house stole some of his tools. Dennis immediately goes to Rick’s office and starts arguing and even fighting with his crew. Rick breaks apart the fight and tells Dennis that he has an emergency job for him if he is interested since Rick recognizes that Dennis is in the construction business. Dennis is troubled by the thought of working for the man who kicked him out of his house, but he is desperate for money, any kind of money, and he accepts.

When Dennis arrives to the scene, he can see that Rick has trouble with his recently foreclosed house, the previous owners backed up the septic tank and skipped town, meaning that the house is literal covered in feces from floor to ceiling. None of the guys from Rick’s crew have the stomach to deal with it, but Dennis accepts to do it for $250.

Rick is impressed with Dennis’ work ethic and his leadership skills, as he manages to talk the rest of the guys into working with him. By the end of the day, the job is done, but Rick calls Dennis once again. This time, Rick has trouble with his personal air conditioning, and he needs some last-minute help. Dennis proves to be an exceptionally talented repair guy, and Dennis offers him a stable job with a decent wage. Dennis would basically be a “yes man.” If Rick needs him for anything, anything at all, Dennis is supposed to show up and deal with the issue. Dennis accepts, and back at the motel, he happily flaunts his first $250 to his mother and his son, feeling like he is doing something right for the first time ever.

Dennis learns the ropes, but it’s expected that he evicts people as well

Dennis starts working with Rick, and Rick is willing to show him the ropes if he is going to be his assistant. He teaches him how to exploit both the government subsidies and the banking system in general through general fraud. At first, Dennis works as a repair guy but slowly starts learning how to spot ideal houses to use for their scams. He slowly progresses from stealing pool pumps and air-conditioning units to Rick’s full-time assistant.

One day, while they were scouting the street for houses soon to be foreclosed on, they noticed that one of the houses was stealing water and gas from one of Rick’s foreclosed properties. The man who stole utilities turns out to be the father of Connor’s friend; he is also about to lose his house but is willing to fight for it in court. He says that he was visiting the library and taking free legal counsel to see what could be done. Dennis wishes him the best of luck but knows that the fight is fruitless.

Soon, Dennis starts evicting people himself, and it weighs difficult on his consciousness, but he needs the money. Dennis starts earning some serious money, but he still doesn’t have enough to buy his old house. Rick and Dennis draw a legal contract that allows Dennis to buy the house from him, but due to some legal things, Dennis and his family can’t move into the house until it is listed for sale by the bank. Still, that doesn’t stop Dennis from showing his mother and son that they bought the house and that it’s soon going to be theirs again.

Dennis’ life starts getting complicated when people start recognizing him

It’s probably not a smart move to evict people while you are living in a motel that is frequented by the people you evicted, and during Connor’s birthday party, one man Dennis evicted recognizes him and starts a fight. The thing is, Lynn and Connor have no idea what Dennis actually does for a living; he lies to them that he has worked on some of the properties that were foreclosed on, but that’s pretty much it. He doesn’t have the stomach to admit that he is working for the same man who is responsible for the fact that they are living in a hotel.

At the same time, Dennis is unwilling to quit his job since Rick, and he is on the verge of a massive deal worth millions, but all they need to do is make sure that the Bank of Santa Fe walks away from a deal they made with their competitor. Dennis decides to sabotage the houses by stealing pumps and air-conditioning units just like the good ol’ times, and the deal is on. Rick and Dennis have the sole right to sell over 1000 houses in the greater Santa Fe area, keeping the commission.

But due to mental pressures Dennis thinks about leaving all of it behind, Rick then reveals that he wasn’t always rich. He tells Dennis the story of how he was dirt poor and how he watched the banks, the government, and big pharma ruined his father’s life and job, leaving them destitute, and this is what motivated him to start screwing over just about everybody.

It’s fine being well off and wanting to secure a decent life and future for your family, but like many businessmen, Rick never knew when to stop. But keep in mind that this isn’t your classic from rags to riches story; this is a story of abusing one of the biggest financial crimes in history that hardly anyone responsible for it actually dealt with the legal consequences.

Rick also tells Dennis not to get too emotional with real estate; small houses, big houses, it doesn’t matter; the only thing that matters is how many you have. The next day, Dennis listens to Rick’s advice, and instead of waiting for the appropriate legal period to move into his old house, he buys a mansion with a pool and everything.

Dennis learns that he is no longer a part of the struggling class

The longer he keeps working for Rick, the more Dennis feels like he sold his soul to the devil. He shows his mother and his son the new house he bought for them but instead of being elated, his mother is freaked out by the fact that he works for Rick and threatens to take herself and Connor to her brother in Tampa.

I mean, this is the part of the movie that pissed me off the most. I truly hated Lynn’s character because ever since the crisis with the house began, she has done absolutely nothing to save the house except for being a deadweight and complainer. I get why she was upset with Dennis, but she could have handled this with more grace and realized what kind of moral hell Dennis went through to get them back on their feet once again.

I’m not saying that she should abandon her principles or anything, but a simple “thank you, no thank you” would have sufficed instead of threatening to take someone’s child away. What is she going to do? Support Connor with her hairdressing? Give me a break, lady; she even admitted at the start of the movie that Dennis had to practically raise her because she has no idea what she’s doing in life.

Anyway, Lynn makes good on her promise and takes Connor away. At the same time, Dennis has trouble at work as well; as it turns out, the Santa Fe deal is at great risk because somebody managed to challenge the foreclosure successfully, and if one person did it, the rest of the neighborhood would soon follow, meaning that the bank is going to pull out of the deal, meaning that Rick and Dennis don’t have their payday.

Rick, with the help of his lawyers, manages to forge a single document that would have trashed the case and allowed the foreclosure to go through. Dennis is supposed to deliver it to the court clerk, and once he arrives at the court, he sees that the man he is supposed to sabotage is the same father of Connor’s friend.

Dennis starts panicking and sweating, and he is about to walk out being unable to do something so evil to the man who tried his best to keep his house (except for pay off the loan….), but the court clerk who’s been paid off by Rick stops him in the last second and takes the document away from him.

The document is ruled as admissible and the house is lost, Rick’s and Deniss’ deal will go through, they will earn millions.

Dennis loses everything

The day of the eviction has arrived, and Rick and Dennis are at the scene; it’s the same house that belongs to the father of Connor’s friend Frank Greene. The police is on the scene and a large crowd of people, but no one exactly dares to go to the house because Frank is know to be an avid collector of firearms.

Their suspicions turn out to be correct; when presented with an option to vacate his house in 2 minutes, Frank starts threatening everyone with a gun while his family is still in the house. Frank knows that the document that showed up at the last minute is fake, but he can’t prove it. Dennis hides behind the police car but knows that there is only one thing to do – he can come clean.

Dennis walks out from behind the car with raised arms and tells Frank that he practically screwed him over, that the document is forged, and that the house is still legally his. At that moment, Frank throws away his gun and goes to surrender to the police peacefully.

Rick walks toward Dennis and thanks him from the bottom of his heart; as two law-enforcement officers lead Dennis to the car, he will presumably be questioned as well as Rick. It’s obvious that the two are in massive trouble now that their scheme is out, so why did Rick thank Dennis?

Dennis was always supposed to be the fall guy

Basically, Rick thanked Dennis because Rick would get away with everything. Think about it: every piece of dirty work that had to be done to scam both the banks and the government was done by Dennis; he was the one who took out the pool pumps, air units, and furniture, and he was also the one that was offering keys for cash deals to people.

Dennis was also the one person who actually delivered the document to the court; Rick was nowhere to be seen; the best-case scenario is that even if Dennis can actually prove that the document is fake, he will have a hard time connecting it to Rick. The worst case scenario is that the judge was also paid off, and Dennis is accused of lying about evidence as well.

Dennis, due to his financial hardship, was the perfect target for a fall guy. He was inexperienced enough to just blindly trust whatever Rick was telling him to do; he was also blind enough not to recognize the shady deal that Rick made with him regarding his old house, which in the court’s eyes would look like only a first step in Denni’s path toward the crime.

The Santa Fe deal will go through, Rick won’t lose anything since Frank Greene is going to prison, the house is still up for sale, and the bank won’t be forced to pull out of the deal. The best case scenario for Dennis at that point is to simply lie to the investigators that he lied about the documents to get Frank to release his family, but no one sane would actually buy it.

The moral of the story is that Rick thanked Dennis because he was his fall guy and Rick would walk away with millions while Dennis is presumably going to prison.

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