Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Evicted in San Francisco

priceonomics.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

11–20 of 257 posts

Re: Evicted in San Francisco

#11

Post by jseliger »

Nonetheless, it’s a good time to be a Bornstein in San Francisco: in the past year alone, Ellis Act evictions have risen 170%; since 1997, there have been 3,811, and that number is constantly rising.

The obvious solution to rapidly rising prices is to increase supply, as described here (http://www.amazon.com/dp/B0078XGJXO) or here (http://www.theatlanticcities.com/housing/2013/10/san-francis...). I've posted both links before but we keep seeing stories like these and the solutions remain the same.

The technology necessary to increase housing supply (steel frames, elevators) is a century old (http://www.slate.com/blogs/moneybox/2013/05/03/silicon_valle...) and well-understood. The problem is almost entirely political.

Re: Evicted in San Francisco

#12

Post by makaveli8 »

kohanz wrote: post #4

Call me cold, but after reading this I come away with almost no sympathy for the evicted senior citizen. She comes across as very entitled.

I feel exactly the same. She even got a $14k resettlement fee! If she didn't want to be evicted out into the cold she should have been a little warmer to her landlord and neighbors instead of being such a nuisance.

Re: Evicted in San Francisco

#13

Post by pyrrhotech »

Another whine story. I do feel sorry for those people that legitimately deserve it. You know, women in the middle east who are beaten or stoned to death for not wearing berkas, or orphans in Africa dealing with genocidal warlords.

But this lady could live perfectly fine on her social security if she would move to somewhere she could afford. Living in San Francisco is something a whole lot of people want to do. That's why it's so damn expensive. I want to do it too, but I don't want to pay that price. That's ok, you shouldn't get everything you want. It's a privilege to live there, not a right.

Re: Evicted in San Francisco

#15

Post by Crito »

> When the current owners, the Withrington brothers, purchased the property in 2002, Inge came with it.

> In San Francisco, a landlord can’t evict a current tenant just because they are selling or buying the property; by the time the unit was purchased, Inge had already been living there for ten years, and she had no intention to go anywhere. Since Inge's unit was illegal, her landlord had even fewer options in the way of legal recourse.

If the new owners were willing to come clean to the city about the illegal unit, then I don't see what the issue would have been. Being the new owners, surely they could not be held responsible for the crime that was committed by the old owner, right?

It seems to me that the only reason why their hands were bound is because they decided to not notify the city immediately after the property became theirs.

Re: Evicted in San Francisco

#16

Post by raldi »

jseliger wrote: post #11

Nonetheless, it’s a good time to be a Bornstein in San Francisco: in the past year alone, Ellis Act evictions have risen 170%; since 1997, there have been 3,811, and that number is constantly rising. The obvious solution to rapidly rising prices is to increase supply, as described here ( http://www.amazon.com/dp/B0078XGJXO ) or here ( http://www.theatlanticcities.com/housing/2013/10/san-francis... ). I've posted both…

> that number is constantly rising

That's a lie: http://infogr.am/ellis-act-evictions

Re: Evicted in San Francisco

#17

Post by ominous_prime »

After seeing some eviction processes myself, I'm not sure what more one can do for someone like this.

I've seen a few evictions where the occupants seem to completely deny what's happening, refuse to help themselves, and refuse outside assistance. On top of the denial, this woman was actively antagonistic, which made things all that much harder.

Yes, the current housing situation in SF is bad, but this is a failure of the social services we provide. The article seems to take issue with the landlord, but what would any of us do in a similar situation, with an illegal and toxic tenant in our house?

Re: Evicted in San Francisco

#18

Post by hnal943 »

normloman wrote: post #7
TrainedMonkey wrote: post #2

"According to Inge, she pursued some of these options, but was turned off by the no-guarantee nature of the wait-lists, and felt she was entitled to stay where she was." So she voluntarily did not use resources designed to help her out. That lands credibility to landlords story. If I lived on fixed income, I would definitely move out of Bay Area somewhere cheaper.

It's not easy for people to just pack up and move. What if you've lived there your whole life? What if your friends and family lived there? What if your job was there? I guess you say "Sorry poor trash, but you gotta be this rich to live here. If you can't cut it, kindly leave the city you've known your whole life, abandon your friends, and get a new job." But that seems cold, doesn't it?

It's not about her being poor so much as uncivil. When you stop paying your rent and you've destroyed the value of the building you live in and fight with the neighbors, it makes it very hard for anyone to want to help you. If she had been cooperative, I don't think this would have even been a story.

Re: Evicted in San Francisco

#19

Post by CodeMage »

normloman wrote: post #7
TrainedMonkey wrote: post #2

"According to Inge, she pursued some of these options, but was turned off by the no-guarantee nature of the wait-lists, and felt she was entitled to stay where she was." So she voluntarily did not use resources designed to help her out. That lands credibility to landlords story. If I lived on fixed income, I would definitely move out of Bay Area somewhere cheaper.

It's not easy for people to just pack up and move. What if you've lived there your whole life? What if your friends and family lived there? What if your job was there? I guess you say "Sorry poor trash, but you gotta be this rich to live here. If you can't cut it, kindly leave the city you've known your whole life, abandon your friends, and get a new job." But that seems cold, doesn't it?

There might be many cases of rich vs. poor in San Franscisco and I'm not disputing that your arguments might be perfectly suited to those. However, if the case presented in this article is the best the author(s) could find, then we're seeing an example of sloppy journalism. Here's why:

"I could send you transcripts of a phone message where she said she will burn the house down if we didn't fix the leaking roof. Or show you the rent increase letter that was returned to me unopened and defaced with 'Fuck You' written on it. We tried to help her."

Basically, you purchase a property from someone else and it comes with a tenant. You try to co-exist with that tenant and she behaves in a manner that is unreasonably hostile. Are we really supposed to be sympathetic? Is this really supposed to make us feel for the plight of people being evicted in San Francisco?

Re: Evicted in San Francisco

#20

Post by yesiamyourdad »

normloman wrote: post #7
TrainedMonkey wrote: post #2

"According to Inge, she pursued some of these options, but was turned off by the no-guarantee nature of the wait-lists, and felt she was entitled to stay where she was." So she voluntarily did not use resources designed to help her out. That lands credibility to landlords story. If I lived on fixed income, I would definitely move out of Bay Area somewhere cheaper.

It's not easy for people to just pack up and move. What if you've lived there your whole life? What if your friends and family lived there? What if your job was there? I guess you say "Sorry poor trash, but you gotta be this rich to live here. If you can't cut it, kindly leave the city you've known your whole life, abandon your friends, and get a new job." But that seems cold, doesn't it?

From the sound of the article she has no family and whatever friends she has don't like her enough to let her live with them.

It's a simple thing: she and her prior landlord were breaking the law. Either SF has to change their zoning laws or she had to comply. Hard to see the property owner as the bad guy. After years of legal action and dealing with someone who honestly sounds like an exceedingly difficult personality, I'd want to sell the house too.

Post reply on HN