Judge OKs sale of Mon View Heights to N.Y. company
It’s hoped that the $7.5M deal will result in “fixing the property and protecting the residents.”
By PAULA REED WARD
TribLive
An Allegheny County judge on Thursday approved the sale of the troubled Mon View Heights apartment complex in West Mifflin to a New York affordable housing company.
Proponents of the $7.5 million sale hope the deal puts the sprawling, more than 300-unit property on a path toward rehabilitation.
“The pending sale provides the best and most effective solution for both fixing the property and protecting the residents,” said attorney Steve Townsend, who represents Merchants Bank of Indiana, which foreclosed on the property in late 2024.
Mon View Heights has long been the subject of scrutiny because of living conditions there. In September 2024, Allegheny County District Attorney Stephen A. Zappala Jr. filed criminal public nuisance charges against the owners.
Since then, Mon View Apts. LLC, which bought the property in 2022, defaulted on the $17 million loan it took to buy the complex.
In December 2024, the property was placed in a receivership, allowing an expert to manage it. While Merchants has advanced more than $2.5 million to keep Mon View operational, conditions of the property, Zappala said, have continued to deteriorate.
Last month, his office filed a petition for a temporary restraining order seeking to take $1 million from any sale proceeds to put toward a video security system, demolition of four buildings and sewer repairs.
However, the bank objects to that request saying the DA has not authority to do so. The issue has been the subject of multiple filings in both civil and criminal court.
As part of her order approving the sale Thursday, Common Pleas Judge Chelsa Wagner wrote: “All persons and entities are prohibited from taking any action to adversely affect or interfere with, or which would be inconsistent with, the ability of the receiver to transfer the mortgaged properties to the purchasers in accordance with this order and the sale agreements.”
Townsend did not have a time frame on when the sale might close and said federal Housing and Urban Develop- ment must also approve it.
West Mifflin Mayor Chris Kelly said he’s optimistic moving forward.
“We’re excited after meeting the new ownership and learning about their plans and renovations they want to do,” he said. “This group has a better track record than anybody that has owned it recently.”
The buyer, Camber Property Group out of New York, specializes in affordable housing communities.
“We’re hoping they can improve the living conditions rapidly,” Kelly said.
Kelly described raccoons falling out of apartment ceilings, holes in floors large enough to lose a dog, exposed electrical outlets and open sewage.
“You have to see the property. It’s unfathomable some of the conditions,” Kelly said. “It’s going to take half an army to get that place up and running fast.”
A joint status conference with criminal court Judge Jill E. Rangos and Wagner, the civil court judge, is scheduled for Aug. 3.
A hearing on the request by the DA’s office to take part of the sale proceeds is scheduled before Rangos on Aug. 28.
