The Guam Housing and Urban Renewal Authority board on Tuesday approved writing off $95,985 in past-due rent payments deemed uncollectible.
According to board meeting documents, this amount is owed to 44 GHURA tenants whose leases were terminated between 2022 and 2024.
GHURA provides affordable housing to low-income residents.
Tenancy agreements were terminated for a variety of reasons, ranging from the death of the tenant to income that was too high to afford GHURA housing to damage to the rental unit.
In one case, a woman was found to have removed the screen door and turned it into a barbecue pit, according to information provided to the GHURA board on Tuesday.
According to Elizabeth Napoli, executive director of GHURA, numerous tenants have moved off the island or had their leases terminated because of disruption to public services – which represent serious breaches of health and safety regulations.
The uncollected amounts range from less than $50 to $11,660 in the case of a single tenant.
Debt collection is handled digitally, but if a GHURA tenant stops paying, an attempt is made to personally send them a reminder for the overdue rent, according to several property managers who spoke with GHURA’s board of directors.
Some residents had been non-payers for many years and used the emergency rental assistance funds to pay back their rent, sometimes from years ago.
If tenants do not respond and continue to be in arrears with their payments, they end up on a termination list.
Although the amounts have been written off, GHURA still reserves the right and obligation to collect them should the opportunity arise, Napoli said.
Napoli added that the list of overdue rents would be forwarded to the Department of Revenue and Taxation and that the tax refunds of any former tenants still working on Guam could be seized to cover the rent.
Tenants’ accounts will also be flagged for debt collection if they try to apply for social housing in another part of the country.
According to Napoli, since the COVID-19 pandemic, GHURA has been receiving requests from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development to accommodate tenants who miss their payments.
She said the aim is to avoid a rise in homeless numbers and that residents will be given more time and every effort will be made to serve them with notices.
“I think what happens with a lot of them is that because they’re behind on rent, they’re usually behind on utilities,” Napoli told commissioners. “Now they have no choice but to shut off utilities. Our site managers have no choice but to send them termination notices because that’s a health and safety violation. That’s a major HUD violation.”
GHURA board members expressed concern that many of the power outages may be due to a lack of information from tenants.
Executive Vice President Nate Sanchez urged property managers to keep them informed in any way possible so that tenants are better informed of their situation and collection problems can be avoided.
“It’s our responsibility to make it clear to them, ‘Hey, we’re here to help you in any way we can, legally and also to protect you. But … in order for us to have your back, you have to have our back, too,'” Sanchez said.
