By JAN LARSON McLAUGHLIN
BG Independent News
This Friday is rent day – the second since the coronavirus shutdown in Ohio – for many residents and businesses.
It will be a day when many tenants won’t be able to pay, and many landlords will face decisions on how to handle those missed payments.
Bob Maurer, of Greenbriar Inc., has heard from many tenants that they will be unable to pay. As of a couple weeks ago, he had received notice from a handful of industrial tenants, several commercial tenants, and many residential renters.
“This is a new ballgame,” Maurer said of the far-reaching effects of the pandemic. “We’re willing to work with them.”
A couple other major landlords in Bowling Green were contacted for comments, but either did not return phone calls or preferred not to speak on the record.
“Every tenant has a little different situation,” Maurer said. “So we’re working with them case by case.”
“It doesn’t do anybody any good to have empty buildings,” he said.
Maurer said his company is willing to defer rent payments – but not forgive them completely.
“The landlord is caught in a ‘Catch-22,’” since they have mortgages that must be paid from the rent coming in, he said.
But Maurer is not unsympathetic to the tenants.
“Everybody knows it’s pretty hard to pay rent when you have no money coming in,” he said. “It’s mighty tough out there.”
Maurer said Greenbriar has a moratorium on evictions and late charges through April or longer.
“We aren’t doing evictions,” he said. “And late charges aren’t appropriate. This is a special circumstance.”
Evictions serve no one right now, he said.
“You’d be really remiss not to work with them if they are a good tenant,” Maurer said.
“We’re all in the same boat.”
So Greenbriar is working with tenants on a month-to-month basis.
“We don’t even know how much the damage will be,” from the pandemic, he said. “It’s a real strain and a real hardship on everybody,” Maurer said.
To protect residential tenants, the Supreme Court of Ohio has asked local courts to postpone eviction filings, eviction proceedings, scheduled move-outs, and the execution of foreclosure judgments as appropriate.
The federal COVID-19 relief act and other federal directives place a temporary period of postponement on many residential evictions and foreclosures. This means judges can temporarily postpone court matters, including eviction cases, regardless of the timelines required by law.
Many residential leases in Bowling Green expire at the end of BGSU’s semester later in May. Though many residential tenants have called Greenbriar about their inability to pay rent right now, only about a dozen have actually left their rental homes, Maurer said.
“We haven’t had very many check out,” he said. “They haven’t turned in their keys.”
Gov. Mike DeWine has taken action to protect businesses from evictions. He issued an executive order addressing commercial property rents, evictions and foreclosures. The order:
- Requests that landlords suspend, for at least 90 days, rent payments for small business commercial tenants facing financial hardship due to the COVID-19 pandemic. It does not negate the obligations of small business commercial tenants to pay rent at a future time.
- Requests that landlords place a moratorium on evictions of small business commercial tenants for at least 90 days.
- Requests that lenders provide commercial real estate borrowers with mortgage loans an opportunity for a forbearance of at least 90 days as a result of a financial hardship due to the COVID-19 pandemic. This means lenders should refrain from enforcing default penalties. It does not negate the obligations of commercial real estate borrowers but provides time for solutions to be worked out.
Maurer has concerns about the chances of survival for some businesses that have had to temporarily shut down.
“I don’t know how long they can make it without any income,” he said. “And they have to pay their employees. They’ve got a lot of headaches.”
“We want them to stay in business. It’s a delicate situation,” he said.
