Let’s get this straight: Arbor One Apartments consistently hasn’t had a certificate of compliance for over two years.
For two years conditions were so bad that the City of Ypsilanti wouldn’t issue the New Jersey-based owner, Valley Tree Partners, the certificate, which would have granted them the right to collect rent. Tenants have had the right to withhold rent ever since, even before the first round of red tags went up around the 637 unit complex, condemning the apartments a few months ago.
For over two years, people have still been moved in and out, offered leases, and evicted. They’ve been robbed by rent and kicked to the curb. Why? Landlords prey on the poor, and law favors the landlord. Meanwhile, conditions have been “condemnable” at Arbor One consistently. Mold, broken doors, water damage, flooding and no heat — all that was mentioned by tenants during canvassing in 2020 has been echoed in 2025.
When Stewart Beal announced he was taking over as property manager, eyes rolled all across Ypsi. Of course, the city’s most notorious slumlord would swoop in to “stand in solidarity with the tenants” and save the Ypsi community — all while slapping his smug face on the high-profile “renovation” project in an attempt to polish his tainted image (and solidify his support by fellow business owners). Let’s not forget he owned the complex years ago, and his intentional mismanagement created these problems in the first place.
Still, his intentions are more sinister than strengthening his monopoly and playing up a savior complex. He is spearheading a “renoviction” to make room for richer tenants:
Here’s how it goes:
- Acquire a massive housing complex that’s falling apart
- Continue to charge rent and let the place deteriorate
- Tenants leave on their own, for their survival
- Save time and money by avoiding formal evictions and court fees
- Renovate vacancies, or demolish the complex once a majority of people are forced to leave and sell the property to a developer
- Move in new, richer tenants
To the public, Beal claims to be working on an 18 month plan. Two months after Beal took over Arbor One the entire place was condemned by the city of Ypsilanti. It’s clear his focus was, of course, getting the rent portals straightened out. Telling tenants, “I think you should continue paying rent.”
Tenants report that work orders are “responded to, but no real improvements have been made.” Putting in a work order really just means inviting Beal or one of his workers to come to your apartment unannounced.
Tenants have seen workers sitting in the parking lot waiting for them to leave and going in the second they step out — without consent or sometimes directly against the tenant’s will. Then all they do is paint over the mold to keep charging rent, and all the while the mold grows deeper. The “renovation” work that he posted on Facebook are all from Arbor Homes, the townhouses across the road, which are not part of the 637 condemnations. It’s all a lie.
Beal plans on “opening [a] fitness center, resident cafe, urban farm area, and dog park next!” But who is that for? For the tenants who have been subjected to slum conditions for close to a decade?
Are tenants supposed to wait a year and a half for a dog park while water pipes keep busting and ACs and other electrical supplies malfunction in the summer temperatures until finally the ceiling collapses on them in the winter? No, because once those improvements are made — and that’s if they are made — rents will increase, and those who will have stayed will be priced out anyway.
Beal, in a true slumlord fashion, just wants tenants to leave on their own, so that different, richer, tenants can replace them and pay the big bills on his investment, and patronize the businesses he funded, in the buildings he owns.
As tenants, we are able to change our conditions through struggling against a landlord. Tenants associations by and for tenants have the power to win, and win big — control over our homes and our lives.
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