CLEVELAND, Ohio — A Cleveland councilman surveyed 8,507 homes for code violations and found a not-so-surprising conclusion in the data: houses owned by out-of-area landlords were much more likely to have issues.

Ward 13 Councilman Kris Harsh set off after his election in 2022 to survey every home in his ward for code violations. He sent the owner of every home a letter, either thanking them for keeping their house in tip-top shape or letting them know they have minor (or sometimes major) problems to fix.

Harsh’s goal, as he described to cleveland.com earlier this year, was to prove that code enforcement works. Even if they weren’t official citations, he said the letters put property owners in Old Brooklyn on notice — and led to home repairs.

The letters offered guidance but were not escalated to city enforcement. Harsh also sent residents a list of home-repair programs on request

After finishing the survey this summer, he crunched the numbers. Out-of-area landlords own just 6.3% of the homes in Ward 13, but those houses accounted for 13% of major violations and 9.9% of minor ones that Harsh found.

Harsh said those investors tend to put little investment into their properties and focus solely on collecting rent. He said the data demonstrates those issues, and that the survey shows that putting these landlords on notice can be a solution.

“This type of investor is a pox on Cleveland — and code enforcement can be our vaccine,” Harsh said in a news release.

Of the 8,507 homes surveyed:

• 6,547 were in excellent condition and required no follow-up, just a thank-you letter

• 1,845 homes received letters about minor exterior issues such as peeling paint, fallen gutters, or lack of handrails.

• 115 properties were flagged for major issues. Harsh said property owners were asked to submit a remediation plan within 30 days. He said some of these cases were later referred to Cleveland’s department of Building and Housing.

Harsh did these surveys from his car, heading up and down the road to view homes from the street. He said he uses property data that has the owners’ names removed, makes notes in shorthand and then brings it back to the office so he can send out letters later.

The survey shows that systematic code inspections work, Harsh said. He’s advocated in the past to add staff to Building & Housing’s so that City Hall staff can do more of these inspections.

Most home inspections are done only after someone files a complaint about a property, but Cleveland has also created a unit to go into neighborhoods for periodic home inspections.