INDIANAPOLIS — The troubled Lakeside Pointe at Nora apartment complex has been sold to a new owner.
New York-based Genesis Housing Foundation will take over the property after Mayor Joe Hogsett’s office announced the sale Tuesday.
“Tuesday morning the City received word that Lakeside Pointe at Nora had been sold,” Hogsett said in a written statement. “While we are hopeful for the future of the property, our top priority continues to be the safety and well-being of the property’s residents.
“We are committed to working with the new owner to address the long deferred maintenance and outstanding enforcement actions. And, we will continue to engage with neighbors and community stakeholders to ensure that the new property owner is meetings its obligations to tenants.”
The city postponed a nuisance lawsuit against New Jersey-based Fox Lake Affordable Housing Inc. in February after the group said it would sell Lakeside Pointe.
The city and the Marion County Public Health Department planned to file the lawsuit if the former owners did not make progress toward fixing health and safety violations at the apartment complex.
Hogsett did not address if the lawsuit could proceed.
Michael N. Red, a Greenwood-based lawyer serving as a contact for Genesis Housing Foundation, said in an email that the company prepared a rehabilitation plan for Lakeside Pointe.
“Like so many who have followed the stories concerning the unfair conditions that the residents of Lakeside have endured due to the declining and unacceptable state of the property and its abandonment by the former owners, Genesis Housing understood the need for new ownership and management to bring real relief to these families,” Red said.
Genesis Housing Foundation plans to address and fix the “emergency and life safety issues in occupied units” and rebuild burned down buildings and address deferred maintenance issues.
“Residents and neighbors of Lakeside will be seeing rapid improvements as Genesis Housing and Elon Property Management begin to clean up and rehabilitate the property,” Red said.
Hogsett said in January that the city received reports in recent years of collapsing ceilings, families going weeks without utilities, maintenance requests going completely unanswered and health issues caused by “unacceptable living conditions.”
There have also been multiple fires at Lakeside Pointe at Nora in the past year.
On June 12, 2021, a fire destroyed the apartment clubhouse, which eventually collapsed. About 25-30 residents were displaced on Nov. 20, 2021, following a fire that blazed through an apartment building on the north side of the complex.
Eight more people were without a place to live on Dec. 1, 2021, after a fire started in a unit that investigators determined resulted from a cooking accident.
WRTV has also covered concerns from residents about mold, broken windows, water damage and other problems in recent years.
Multiple residents explained in interviews how they went more than a week without hot water, had broken pipes or experienced sewage leaks. Others said language barriers prevented some residents from being able to speak up about their experiences.
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