Top 10 stories of the year — No. 10: Hermiston apartment complex offers buyouts to tenants
Published 1:00 pm Tuesday, December 20, 2022
- Jennifer Baros, Highland Manor resident, stands behind a table of yard sale items Feb. 12, 2022. She is among the tenants moving out of the Hermiston apartment complex. The new owner is encouraging people to leave so he can renovate.
HERMISTON — Residents of a 46-unit apartment complex in Hermiston in early February had to find new places to live.
The new owner of the apartment complex, Clover Housing Group LLC, notified residents in a letter they would have to move. The company also offered $2,000 to tenants who could vacate by March 1, one month after the letter’s date. And the letters stated tenants would receive a full refund of their security deposits, “as long as the apartment is reasonably clean.”
Isaac Pulido received the letter. A Highland Manor tenant since December 2020, he lived in an apartment with two beds and one bath and paid $630 per month in rent, he said.
Pulido reported feeling “stressed out” by his situation, as there are not many available places to live in Hermiston.
“Two-thousand dollars will cover most security deposits in this area and moving costs, but it won’t help with those families who are in need of affordable housing but don’t quite make the margin for low-income housing,” he said.
Mike Atkinson, owner of Clover Housing, said he sympathized with his tenants, but he has big plans for the apartments.
“They’re old apartments,” he said. “They need a facelift.”
A few residents on Feb. 12 braved temperatures in the low 30s to sell belongings to clear out their homes and make a few more bucks before moving.
Karen Dela Cruz was offering gardening equipment and other goods at the sale. At 72 years old, she said, she has health problems as does her husband. She added her situation with the apartment has exacerbated their illnesses, causing stress.
“We don’t have energy to fight,” she said. “We just have to find a place.”
She added she doubted she could find an apartment with rent as low as the $630 she paid at Highland Manor.
The East Oregonian is counting down its top 10 local news stories of 2022 (barring, of course, another major news story before the end of the year).
We derived our top 10 from analytics about what was popular online as well as discussion about what was newsworthy. Our top 10 contains a variety of stories, and we also encourage you to share your ideas for top 10 local news stories.
