Senator Brown Takes On Tons Of Landlords to Fight for Renters
When there’s a problem in the economy that hurts households and increases the prices, there’s a good chance you’ll see a Wall Street behind this scheme causing it or taking advantage of it, or making it worse.
All across Ohio some private equity firms, big investors, and the country saw a housing shortage, a captive market of families who needed affordable places for them to live in it. To solve that they purchased properties, raised rents, and cut maintenance. They priced out family homebuyers and the renters were forced out of their homes.
According to a published post by Ironton Tribune, an example of these bad actors is Pinebrook, he has bought up more than 27,000 single-family homes in 20 states, including Cincinnati with more than 3,000 homes. A lot of residents of VineBrook’s Cincinnati properties have contacted Sherrod Brown’s office reporting neglectful ownership practices.
One of the residents reached out for help to Vinbrook but after she submitted multiple maintenance requests to get her heart repaired. Pinebrook failed to respond to the resident and was left without heat for weeks in the dead cold of winter.
When there’s a problem in the economy that hurts households and increases the prices, there’s a good chance you’ll see a Wall Street behind this scheme causing it or taking advantage of it, or making it worse. (Photo: Ironton Tribune)
Out-Of-State Landlords Face Sen. Brown
At Pinebrook, issues like maintenance problems have been so common at the properties that the City of Cincinnati sued the company for unpaid fines, water bills, and fees. Some of the company’s properties were very dangerous that the city ordered them to get vacated.
Vine rook also has a pattern of aggressively raising the rents and evicting tenants that are working hard from their homes. In Cincinnati, VineBrook is now the top evictor and one of Ms. Cotleur’s colleagues at Cincinnati legal aid said that VineBrook is one of the worst landlords in their service area.
Well, of course, rental housing is a business and owners provide a decent place to live, in exchange for collecting each month the people’s hard-earned money in rent.
But if your building doesn’t even have a working heat to warm people, or isn’t being maintained properly, or if you’re jumping at the chance to evict your tenants and to set them up for surprise fees, you are not holding up your end of the deal.
It is very unacceptable and Sen. Sherrod Brown won’t let VineBrook or any other investor like him jeopardize the lives of the hard-working people of Ohio.
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