Cleveland didn’t win its battle to stop the auction this week of a set of deteriorating apartment buildings near Shaker Square. But a federal court said the city could take action to make sure that any new owner would be required to bring the properties up to code.
Lender Fannie Mae started foreclosing on the $22.6 million mortgage on the 15 buildings in the Shaker Square apartment corridor in 2024. (Fourteen are in Cleveland and one in Shaker Square.)
Late last year, Cleveland officials went to court in an effort to stop the government-sponsored agency from auctioning the buildings. Mayor Justin Bibb’s administration and neighborhood organizations such as the Morelands Group said they feared an auction would attract investors more interested in making quick money than fixing up the buildings. The buildings are commonly called the Steiner properties because they were owned by investment companies controlled by Mendel Steiner, the late Brooklyn, N.Y., real estate investor…