Troubled investor Home REIT has admitted that it is facing arrears across its portfolio.
The investor, which has come under attract from a short-seller claiming it is not delivering on a number of promises, has been forced to announce a u-turn on its statement at the end of last year that it had no issues with its rent collection.
Reports surfaced earlier this month in which two of its tenants said they were withholding rent payments after the business had failed to deliver promised cash to refurbish, insure and provide other services across the portfolio of properties they are renting from Home REIT.
Shortseller Viceroy had last year claimed that some of Home REIT’s tenants were not paying rents, an allegation Home REIT had dismissed, saying it had collected 100% of rental income.
However, the group has now said it has seen a “general deterioration” in its rent collection since it rebutted Viceroys’s claims in late November, and tenants Big Help Group and Noble Tree Foundation had failed to pay “rent contractually due for the quarter to 30 November 2022”.
Noble Tree and Big Help both dispute their rental obligations to the company.
Home REIT said it was reviewing all the options available to obtain payment of overdue rent and was “taking further mitigating actions, including additional resourcing and increased engagement” with its tenants. This includes appointing a specialist housing property manager that will “assist the existing management team with tenant liaison and monitoring, rent collection and underlying asset performance”.
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