Red, pink and taxes: The East Lansing landlord and his 42 Lansing rental properties

LANSING, Mich. (WLNS) – A local landlord is renting out properties to residents in Lansing, even though records show many have not been certified as rentals and some of the properties have even been red-tagged, which means they’re not safe to live in.

Christian Nwobu owns 25 properties in the city, and property records from the city show he is responsible for 17 more properties owned by a limited liability company that is “ not in good standing ” with the state of Michigan since February 16, 2021. He is responsible for the property taxes on all 42 properties.

All of the properties have a history in city property records of being rental properties – some with lapsed registrations and certifications, some with pink tags, some with red tags and many in a limbo where failure to register letters have been sent, but code officials have not entered any further enforcement actions.

A 6 News investigation has discovered at least 20 of those properties are red-tagged. In some instances, the red tag status of the property was not reflected in city property records available to the public.

The properties often had overgrown grass. 6 News teams witnessed bags of rotting items on one property, tarps on the roof of another as well as caution tape affixed to a stair case on the side of the home. In some instances, the buildings were partially boarded up, although the doors behind the boards were not closed or missing. Some of the properties had grass that stood mid-thigh on team members. In one property, a broken window was closed to the elements with a paper certificate and tape.

Red, Pink and Taxes: Left living in unsafe homes

In one instance, the doors of the home were wide open – despite a requirement in the ordinance the building be secured. Neighbors of that recently red-tagged home in the 900 block of Cleveland St. expressed concern for their safety about former tenants returning to the property at night. 6 News reached out to city officials that night and Lansing Police cleared the property and code compliance came in and boarded the property up. Neighbors tell 6 News the former tenants have returned and attempted to gain entry to the property on at least two occasions since.

A year ago, Heather Romero visited this property as she sought a new place to live. She tells 6 News she was appalled by the conditions inside the property. She shared this video from inside the property with 6 News.

In another instance, a property in the 700 block of Magnolia was red-tagged in March. The woman who lives there with her young children tells 6 News she is working to find a new place to live and recently got approved for Section 8 Housing vouchers. She says  Nwobu has been pushing her to pay rent, despite the property being red-tagged as unsafe. She tells 6 News she pays $950 a month for the property and last paid him in March when he asked for the money so he could “pay taxes.”

She tells 6 News she was approached to rent the property by Nwobu’s wife, Gloria, while she was living in a hotel with her children. The woman said she is uncertain how Gloria was aware of her situation, but offered her the house on Magnolia St. To escape homelessness, the woman accepted the offer, only to find the home was unkept with mold issues that she says the Nwobus never addressed.

City records reveal the property’s rental certification expired Nov. 1, 2022. Nwobu was issued a permit to work on the roof and siding on the house in September of 2023. That was finalized on Oct. 2, 2023. The next day, the city issued a pink tag. On March 1, 2024, it was red-tagged for lack of certification.

The woman lived in the property throughout this time, and notes that roofing materials remained on the property for months after the roofing work was completed.

Over on Farrand St., a woman who rents a home attached to a commercial property on Cesar Chavez Ave. says she is being sued for not paying rent – which she refuses to do because the property is red-tagged. She said having a history of evictions makes finding a home difficult. She says Nwobu is threatening to evict her from the red-tag property.

After initially agreeing to talk, Nwobu cancelled an interview with 6 News and has not responded to calls, texts, or e-mails since then.

City Spokesman Scott Bean tells 6 News all red-tagged properties in the city are visited at least once a month for a 360-degree look at the property.

“If code finds someone living in a red-tagged house, they call LPD,” Bean says. He was uncertain how code enforcement officers were unaware of the two families 6 News identified.

Bean declined to discuss the specifics of Nwobu’s properties or actions the city may be taking to address them at this time.

Two are officially pink-tagged, which means the property has not been inspected and there may be conditions in the property in need of repair. Another 17 of the properties are not currently certified as rentals – but haven’t been officially red or pink tagged, according to city records. Of those uncertified properties, several have been inspected and are awaiting final registration – but Nwobu has to pay taxes, as well as city fees and fines for those properties before they can be finalized.

When 6 News visited the pink tag properties, in two instances they identified persons who did not live in the property at the time the pink tag was issued.

In the 900 block of Maryland Ave. 6 News spoke with a man who lived in a Nwobu property there. He said he signed a lease with Nwobu in December 2023. But city records show the property he rented was pink-tagged on May 11, 2023. There were no stickers on the property.  He said he thought something was off when he made the deal to rent the property, but went ahead anyway.

One woman who lives in a home in the 400 block Clemens that is pink tagged says she entered into a lease with Nwobu in April for the property. Under the lease, she pays the utilities and $850 a month. She says she paid Nwobu rent through July in advance.

The last registration and certification expired in Oct. 5, 2022.

Property records show Nwobu has not paid to have the property reinspected and has been hit with late registration fees in both April and March of this year.

“I feel like I got played,” she told 6 News. She said she had no idea the property was not a registered and certified rental with the city when she rented the property to be the home for herself and her children.

Asked how landlords are allowed to rent, pink-tagged units to new tenants, in violation of the ordinance, Bean said enforcement of the pink-tag aspects of the law are “very difficult.”

In the 1100 block of Camp St., 6 News met a woman who rents a Nwobu property. She receives Section 8 Housing vouchers, she said, and snagged the property in an act of desperation. Her voucher was set to expire days before she agreed to move into the property.

City records reveal the property’s rental certification expired April 1, 2023. Nwobu was sent a failure to comply notification letter by the city Jan. 26, 2024. Records show he has paid late fees for the property and an inspection fee, but it remains uncertified and registered.

The woman tells 6 News she had issues with the hot water heater in her basement. But rather than hire a licensed professional to address the issues identified in an inspection, Nwobu and one of his crew members moved the water heater a few feet. She said she also had concerns with the thermostat in the house. A furnace expert determined the issue was the wiring between the furnace and the thermostat, requiring a licensed electrician to repair it. Instead, Nwobu had a maintenance man put a switch in place of the thermostat so she could manually turn the furnace on and off. The switch was ultimately replaced with a thermostat, that has worked properly since, she reported.

“I honestly don’t know how this passed an inspection,” the woman told 6 News, referring to the required Section 8 inspection.

Section 8 is funded with federal Housing and Urban Development dollars and every property paid for with Section 8 housing dollars is supposed to be inspected visually by an approved authority. The Lansing Housing Commission conducts those inspections in the Lansing area.

LHC Executive Director Doug Fleming said he did not receive an email from 6 News, but on Thursday said his agency oversees two Section 8 programs.

With Section 8 vouchers overseen and distributed by Lansing Housing Commission, the agency’s rules require the property to be certified and registered as a rental with the city of Lansing.

But, Michigan State Housing Development Authority rules prohibit inspecting agencies from taking into account the city’s rental registration and certification programs. MSDHA certifications are conducted by federal Housing and Urban Development trained inspectors. And those inspections, called HQS inspections may pass a property, but that property could be in violation of city ordinances — or vice versa.

LHC oversees 800 such accounts for MSHDA, as well as vouchers issued through their own programs.

Just six of the properties are currently certified as rentals, city records show. Under city ordinances, rental properties must be inspected and certified as registered rentals with the city.

Some of the properties 6 News visited did not have evidence tags, but city property and code records available online reveal the properties have been red-tagged or pink-tagged for months and years. Bean says removal of pink and red tags is a common issue and is a crime. However, “We can’t do anything unless we see them removing it.”

A property in the 300 block of E. Hazel St. the tenant tells 6 News the property is up to code and inspected as a rental because he and his family did the work to make it that way. In exchange, Nwobu charges him just $750 a month for the house in rent. The registration and certification expire this year, according to city records.

Tenants 6 News spoke with all reported Nwobu to be unreliable in addressing concerns and problems in the properties.

Over in the 3300 block of Independence Ln the resident there confirmed the property was not registered. City records reveal the home has not been certified and registered since 2014.

Jimmy Brown, the resident, tells 6 News Nwobu assured him when the April 2024 failure to register notice came to his home the registration would be addressed. Brown tells 6 News he is grateful to Nwobu for helping him out of homelessness by providing the property for him.

City records show the property Brown is living in has not been registered and certified as a rental property since 2020.

Despite the laws prohibiting people from living in red-tagged homes, 6 News found two families living in two different red-tagged properties. The  teams also fielded reports of tenants illegally entering red-tagged properties. In one instance, 6 News found a crew that claimed to be working on the property in a home in north Lansing, after 8 p.m. in violation of the city ordinance. The team identified two properties that were pink-tagged for years, but where the tenants say had entered into rental agreements within the last few months.

Tenants tell 6 News they are paying between $850 and $1200 a month for these properties.

But records provided by the Ingham County Treasurer show Nwobu is delinquent on property taxes.

Ingham County Treasurer Alan Fox tells 6 News that for Nwobu to completely erase his back-due tax debt with the city of Lansing, he would have to pay the county – as of May 12, 2024 — $306,092.44.

Everyday that passes without payment of the taxes, more interest accrues, Fox noted.

Fox tells 6 News Nwobu owes the most in back due taxes of any individual property owner in the county.

Fox says Nwobu is a regular with delinquent taxes, showing up at the offices to pay his taxes just in time to prevent them from being seized in tax foreclosure. County records reveal his tax payments have been sent to the county nearly every year since 2014.

Fox confirmed paying delinquent taxes at the last moment to prevent tax foreclosure appeared to be “his business model.”

Under Michigan law, a municipality bills a property own for taxes due. If those taxes aren’t paid in a year, they are transferred to the county treasurer. The tax bill sits, collecting interest and fees, for another year. Then a notice of tax foreclosure is published, providing the property owner one year to pay of the now two-year tax bill. If at the end of those three years, the bill has not been paid, the county takes the property and sells it at auction to cover the cost of the past due taxes.

Fox said Nwobu likely pays enough in fees and interest on his overdue taxes to the county to fund a full-time staff member at the treasurer’s office.

Nwobu originally agreed to an interview on May 17 at 3:30 p.m. But at 11:55 a.m. on May 17, after reviewing questions from 6 News he canceled the interview.

“I received your email this morning and has read it,” he wrote in an email canceling the interview. “I will be consulting third party in regards to that and cannot meet with you today, I still need sometimes. You can get information to your questions from appropriate departments.”

Over the course of the last three days 6 News has repeatedly texted Nwobu in an attempt to schedule an interview, but has not received any responses from him.

On Tuesday night, 6 News stopped at his home in East Lansing. The team texted Nwobu notifying him they were in front of his house. A short time after the text, a minivan his neighbor identified as the vehicle he drives, turned onto his street, and drove very slowly past the 6 News team. The vehicle was driven, the neighbor said, by his older daughter. It did not stop. Nwobu did not respond to the text.

But he has asked Lansing City Council for help.

In an undated letter stamped received by Lansing City Clerk Chris Swope July 7, 2023, Nwobu asked the Lansing City Council to approve a tax payment plan for four of the 42 properties he is responsible for. He argued the payment plan would prevent the properties from become red-tagged.

“We want to clarify we are not intentionally avoiding tax payments,” he wrote in the letter, arguing he had made “a minimum of $90,000” in overdue taxes in the first three months of 2023. He also claimed “over $40,000 spent on bringing houses up to code and addressing correction notices and red-tagged properties.”

Nwobu appeared before Lansing City Council on July 10, 2023, to plead his case in person during public comment.

Lansing City Councilwoman, and then Council President Carol Wood told Nwobu, “Council doesn’t have the ability to waive ordinances.” She indicated the request from Nwobu had been referred to the Lansing City Attorney’s office.

He alleged in the letter much of his financial woe was related to the pandemic.

“The impact of the pandemic has affected everyone,” he wrote, “and the rental income is insufficient to cover these tax payments.”

Two of the tenants 6 News met with said Nwobu worked with them to apply for and receive COVID Emergency Rental Assistance (CERA) dollars to cover rent during the pandemic. The Michigan State Housing Development Authority maintains the records of the money dolled out under the federal program. The agency was unable to immediately provide the total amount of money distributed to properties Nwobu was responsible for during the pandemic. Nwobu declined to provide an amount. 6 News has filed a records request for an accounting of those dollars provided to Nwobu’s properties under CERA.

In previous instances when properties have been identified that were red-tagged or ineligible under Lansing Housing Codes to be rental properties, but received CERA dollars; MSHDA has opened fraud investigations on the property owner. City Pulse reported in March 2023.

Online records compiled by Small Business Advice , or SBA.com, from the U.S. Treasury Department reveal Nwobu received $5,200 in Paycheck Protection Plan loans on April 23, 2021.

UPDATE: This story has been updated to include comments from Lansing Housing Commission Executive Director Doug Fleming.

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