What the notice is
A condemnation is the city's Department of Building & Housing recording that a structure is unfit for occupancy. It is a filed violation with its own type, published like any other, and it names what was condemned: the main structure, or the garage, as separate notices.
Since January 2024 the city filed 1,182 condemnations of a main structure and 808 of a garage — 2,042 in total, across 34 of Cleveland's neighbourhoods.
The number that matters is how many are still open
A condemnation is not a one-day event. It stays on the record until the condition is resolved or the structure comes down, and the city publishes whether it is still active. 1,341 of those 2,042 — 66% — were still open when we last read the file.
That ratio is the useful part. A neighbourhood with many condemnations that close quickly is being repaired. One where two thirds stay open is not, and a buyer walking a street there is looking at a standing condition rather than a historical one.
Why the garage counts separately
A condemned garage and a condemned house are very different facts about a property, and the city files them as different notices. Counting them together — which a careless reading of the total would do — would inflate the number of unfit homes by roughly two fifths. The lists on this site keep them distinguishable for that reason.
Where they cluster
Five neighbourhoods carry more than half of them: Glenville (292), Broadway–Slavic Village (236), Union–Miles (187), Mount Pleasant (170) and Collinwood–Nottingham (131).
Those are the same five that lead the city's vacancy reports, which is not a coincidence and is treated in the vacancy guide.
What a condemnation does not tell you
- Not who owns it. This service never publishes owner names, in any city.
- Not what it is worth. A condemnation is a condition, not a valuation, and nothing here converts one into the other.
- Not that it is coming down. Condemnation and demolition are separate steps, and most condemned structures in the record have not been demolished.
- Not that it is safe now. A closed notice means the city recorded a resolution, on a date. It is a filing, not an inspection you commissioned.