Alan Nochumson

September 05, 2024 | The Legal Intelligencer

the Pennsylvania Superior Court held that a commercial tenant was evicted from the leased premises rather than abandoning it and that, accordingly, the landlord could only recover damages for unpaid rent through the date when the landlord recovered possession of the leased premises, denying the landlord's claim for additional rent for the remainder of the lease term.

By Alan Nochumson and Alex Hamilton

7 minute read

August 14, 2024 | The Legal Intelligencer

In In re Appeal of Council Member Cindy Bass, the Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court affirmed, in part, a decision by Philadelphia's Zoning Board of Adjustment (ZBA), finding that a real estate developer's evidence established an unnecessary hardship because it proved that the property, a vacant lot that needed costly environmental remediation, was practically valueless without the granting of a variance under the Philadelphia Zoning Code.

By Alan Nochumson and Alex Goldberg

8 minute read

July 08, 2024 | The Legal Intelligencer

In two recent cases of note to property owners in Pennsylvania, the Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court sided with the city government in Philadelphia regarding the imposition of substantial fines for continuous building code violations issued by the city of Philadelphia's Department of Licenses and Inspections (L&I).

By Alan Nochumson and Jared Klein

8 minute read

June 07, 2024 | The Legal Intelligencer

Earlier this year, the Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court found that a real estate tax sale was properly voided where the County Tax Claim Bureau failed to provide a property owner with actual notice of the real estate tax delinquency and where it failed to establish on the record that it met all notice requirements under Pennsylvania law.

By Alan Nochumson and Alex Hamilton

8 minute read

April 29, 2024 | The Legal Intelligencer

In a recently published opinion, the Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court in Shyam Ventures v. Zoning Hearing Board of the Borough of Castle Shannon, 2024 Pa. Commw. LEXIS 76 (Pa. Cmwlth. Mar. 7, 2024), set clear limits on the expansion of a legal nonconforming use and when such an expansion may be considered an entirely new use altogether.

By Alan Nochumson and Alex Goldberg

7 minute read

April 10, 2024 | The Legal Intelligencer

In a recently published opinion, the Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court in RDM Group v. Pittston Township Zoning Hearing Board found that a local zoning hearing board and the corresponding trial court abused its discretion by failing to properly evaluate the merits of zoning variance requests of a property owner that sought to build a warehouse in Pittstown Township.

By Alan Nochumson and Alex Hamilton

8 minute read

March 05, 2024 | The Legal Intelligencer

In a recently published opinion, the Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court in Johnson v. Pocono Township Zoning Hearing Board, found that an owners' use of their property as a short-term rental was a legal, existing nonconformity even after an ordinance outlawed such a use in the municipality.

By Alan Nochumson and Alex Goldberg

8 minute read

January 31, 2024 | The Legal Intelligencer

In a recently published opinion, the Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court in Chaffier v. Hellertown Borough Zoning Hearing Board, struck down an attempted change in a property's zoning classification as illegal spot zoning.

By Alan Nochumson and Alex Hamilton

9 minute read

January 09, 2024 | The Legal Intelligencer

Last year, the city of Philadelphia created an online portal called the landlord gateway program which allows for easy, centralized access to the resources needed for current and prospective landlords to navigate the city's processes and requirements in single location. In this article, we give a brief overview of the topics covered in the gateway and provide a basic checklist for aspiring and existing landlords.

By Alan Nochumson and Alex Goldberg

8 minute read

December 04, 2023 | The Legal Intelligencer

In a recent decision, the Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court in City of Philadelphia v. A Kensington Joint, cautioned that local governments in Pennsylvania desiring to demolish an allegedly unsafe building structure may need to rely on more than just an inspection of the exterior of the building structure before having it demolished by way of court order.

By Alan Nochumson and Alex Goldberg

8 minute read