When an apartment building is foreclosed on, the tenants are usually evicted—whether the new buyer wants them or not, says the Boston Globe:

Stephen O’Brien wants to buy a foreclosed apartment building on Warwick Street in Roxbury. He wants to keep the ground-floor tenant, James Evans, 77, who is partially blind and living on Social Security.

But the company that is selling the foreclosed building told O’Brien it must be emptied of tenants before it can be resold, a standard industry practice.

“It’s insane,” said O’Brien, who lives near Evans and owns three apartment buildings in the neighborhood. “It’s just obviously insane. And even if they’re trying to manage it in a way that benefits them, then the problem is that they have absolutely no concern for the individual.”

The story follows Mr. O’Brien’s futile quest to find out who owns the building and why they are refusing to sell it to him as is. The Globe tried to help, contacting the bank that owns the building.

O’Brien called the law firm that handled the foreclosure for Deutsche Bank. He wanted to inspect the building so he could determine a fair price.

“The lawyer I spoke to said they wouldn’t let anybody in until everybody is out and they’ve cleaned it,” he said.

He said he received a similar response from New England Property Solutions. Then, he tried to contact Deutsche Bank directly. No response.

A spokesman for Deutsche told the Globe, “We’re going to decline to comment for the piece. We just don’t see an upside in explaining this stuff.”

Mr. Evans probably sees the upside.

As foreclosures mount, tenants suffer [Boston Globe] (Thanks, Arthur!)
(Photo:Globe Staff / Mark Wilson)

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