A generous landlord in Brooklyn astonished his local community in the most heartwarming way after he canceled this month's rent for hundreds of tenants, NBC New York reports.
At the end of the last month, Mario Salerno - who owns about 80 apartments with 200 tenants - posted a notice on the front doors of all his 18 buildings. The notice revealed that rent would be waived for the month of April.
It read: "Please note I am waiving rent for the month of April 2020. Stay safe, help your neighbors and wash your hands!!!"
Watch as an outspoken doctor drops this truth bomb about the government's handling of coronavirus on Fox News:The motivation behind the kind gesture was that people had been expressing concerns about not being able to pay their rent amid the ongoing coronavirus crisis - which has led to lockdowns in many places.
In an interview with NBC New York, Salerno said that people's mental health and overall wellbeing was more important than his rental income.
He said:
"I want everybody to be healthy. That’s the whole thing. For me, it was more important for people’s health and worrying about who could put food on whose table. I say don’t worry about paying me, worry about your neighbor and worry about your family."
One of Salerno's tenants, Paul Gentile, lost his job last month as businesses in the city were forced to close. The 28-year-old lawyer, who has lived in his apartment for nearly four years said of his landlord in an interview with The New York Times:
"You don’t see that, especially in a landlord-tenant relationship in New York City. He’s amazing. It has alleviated a huge amount of stress that I have been having with the unemployment system in the state."
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