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Billy Kesselring
Billy Kesselring
WCLO's Beth Wheelock reports on the possibility of an agreement between a landlord and Alliant Energy.
JANESVILLE — Billy Kesselring served his country in the U.S. Army, and now he wants to help his fellow countrymen who are struggling.
But that big heart could lead to a housing crisis in Rock County if Kesselring and Alliant Energy don't reach an agreement on a $30,000 utility bill spread across 14 properties.
This isn't how it was supposed to happen. Kesselring started buying properties two years ago after he got out of active duty with hopes of making a living from his property and construction businesses. He bought most of his 19 properties—a total of 21 buildings—just more than a year ago, before major layoffs hit Rock County.
"It was just a normal, entry-level real estate investment," he said.
Kesselring put every penny he had into fixing up the buildings, some of which badly needed repair, he said.
Many of his tenants were low-income, but they paid their rent on time until about six months ago, when the economy took a major turn for the worse.
Now many of his tenants can't find jobs, he said. He told of one tenant who found a part-time, seasonal job at a tax service and is paying him $40 a week in rent.
Of the 83 occupied units he owns, just 22 are up-to-date on the rent, he said.
He said he is owed $110,000 in back rent, equal to three months' rent for every tenant. He owes $30,000 to Alliant Energy, which has threatened to cut power to 14 properties.
Kesselring didn't realize how serious the situation was until he received notices of disconnection from Alliant last week, he said. He wasn't on a formalized payment plan, but he was paying whatever he could each month.
"I was under the assumption that if I'm making an effort to pay, that we wouldn't have been in the situation that we're in," he said.
He didn't want to evict his tenants because he knew they had no options, he said.
"If tenants were not trying at all, I did unfortunately have to evict five people," he said. "But the ones who were trying, that's who we're trying to help."
Kesselring was trying to help, but he went about it in the wrong way, said Marc Perry, director of planning and development for Community Action of Rock and Walworth Counties.
"It is good people with the best of intentions that often do the most damage," he said. "I think that's what this case is."
By letting tenants fall behind on rent, Kesselring fell behind on his own responsibilities, Perry said. Instead, people who can't pay bills should get help from established community and government assistance programs.
"It's prolonging the inevitable," Perry said. "People have to have income. People have to pay their bills … People who don't have income coming in right now need to find help."
Kesselring agrees. That's why he's been lobbying city and other officials for months for more housing assistance, he said. He's worked with the Homeless Intervention Task Force and Vision 2020, a group dedicated to eliminating child poverty.
He worries that his situation is just a small part of the joblessness and poverty sweeping the county, and he wants what's best for his tenants, he said.
"I truly do care about every one of them. I know them all by name," he said. "I want to see them succeed."
Still, he knows he will have to be stricter about rent in the future, he said.
"We obviously have to make the tough choices," he said.