Seller accepted payments for years, then called them rent

A seller accepted monthly payments on a $105,000 home for three years - then tried to call them rent. Appeals court was not buying it. 

The Eleventh District Court of Appeals in Lake County affirmed on October 13, 2026, that a 2019 agreement between two sisters-in-law over a Painesville Township property was an enforceable land installment contract, where monthly payments count toward ownership, not a lease with an option to purchase. 

The deal was simple enough on paper. In September 2019, the seller and buyer signed an “Agreement to Sell Real Estate” with a $105,000 purchase price, a $15,000 deposit, and $1,000 monthly payments. But the agreement also stated that $90,000 was due at closing on November 1, 2019 - barely six weeks after signing. The buyer testified that minutes after signing, the seller told her the monthly payments would reduce the balance and she had five years to pay it off. 

The buyer moved in, started paying, and never missed a month. The seller confirmed as much in her own deposition. 

Then came a February 2022 letter. The seller accused the buyer of breaching the contract by failing to pay “lump sum amounts.” But that same letter referred to a “rent to buy property” and acknowledged a “5-year mark agreed upon to have the property paid off in full.” The seller offered two options: return the property and treat all payments as rent, or get a bank loan within six months. 

The buyer disputed any lump-sum arrangement. The seller filed a forcible entry and detainer action in October 2022. After a prior appeal that reversed the municipal court for lack of jurisdiction and a due process violation, the case went to a bench trial in the Lake County Court of Common Pleas. On December 29, 2025, the trial court ruled the agreement was a land installment contract. 

The appeals court affirmed on two grounds. The agreement substantially complied with Ohio’s land installment contract statute, R.C. 5313.02(A). And where the contract was ambiguous - closing date versus monthly payment terms - extrinsic evidence overwhelmingly supported the buyer. Checks marked “pago casa” (house payments), uncontradicted testimony about roof replacement, re-insulation, and other improvements all pointed the same way. 

The court emphasized that R.C. Chapter 5313 is a consumer protection statute. It was “not designed as a way for sellers to escape from contracts they wished to void.” The seller drafted the agreement; the omissions in it cut against her, not the buyer. 

For mortgage professionals who encounter land installment contracts, the takeaway is direct: Ohio courts require only substantial compliance with R.C. 5313.02(A), and sellers cannot weaponize their own drafting gaps to unwind a deal after years of accepting payments.