Carried a second on a small mixed-use in Akron, buyer stopped paying month nine, and the first lender just sent a notice of default

Ohio is a judicial foreclosure state so that 90-day window you're thinking about is probably optimistic once you factor in court scheduling. In my experience watching similar situations in the Midwest, from NOD to actual sheriff sale you're often looking at six to nine months minimum, sometimes longer if the borrower's attorney files any kind of response or the court docket is backed up. Summit County in particular has had congested foreclosure dockets. So you likely have more runway than the notice implies, but do not count on it and do not let that lull you into waiting too long on the cure decision.

On curing the first: in Ohio, paying the arrears to bring the senior current does not automatically subrogate you into the first lien position and it does not change your standing as a junior lienholder. You are still second. What it does is stop the foreclosure clock so you don't get wiped at a sale you weren't ready for. Your real play here given your numbers is straightforward on paper. You paid 31k on a 58k note, the property is at 195k, the first has 112k left, so there's real equity in there for you if you can either get the deed or push through to sale and bid. The 4,800 cure is cheap insurance relative to what you stand to lose if a sale happens before you're positioned. What I'd actually do is cure it now, simultaneously send a formal reinstatement demand letter to the borrower, and start the parallel track of your own foreclosure on the second while you still control the timeline.

Cure the 4,800 now, it protects your 31k basis without touching your lien priority.

Curing the first does not change your lien position or subordination, that is a common misread. What it does in Ohio is restart the clock on the senior default and, more practically, it signals to the first lender that there is an active junior who is paying attention. Some servicers will actually slow-walk their own process once they see a junior cure because it reduces their headache at sale. You are spending 4,800 to protect a position on a note you bought for 31k against a 58k balance on a property that probably clears 195k after the first's 112k, meaning your recovery window is real. That math is not close. The thing I would not do right now is contact the borrower before you have decided what you actually want out of this, because if they smell a workout coming they may file a chapter 13 just to freeze everything, and in Ohio that buys them considerably more time than the foreclosure timeline itself would.

The piece that is specific to Akron and to mixed-use is that the commercial component of the building complicates what a bankruptcy stay does to the property's income stream, and it also affects how a sheriff's sale bidder values it. Residential-only in Summit County moves more predictably at sheriff's sale. Mixed-use with a vacant commercial unit or a troubled tenant can get bid down or go to a single bidder at a number you do not want. I have seen junior lienholders in similar spots in Northeast Ohio watch a sale happen at exactly the first lender's credit bid because nobody else showed up willing to take on the commercial piece. If you cure now and then open a quiet conversation with the borrower from a position of strength, you have more options than if you just hold and hope the sale produces competitive bidding.