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“Your monthly rent .. shall increase from $2145 to $8900”

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Re: “Your monthly rent .. shall increase from $2145 to $8900”

#181

Post by kartikkumar »

So, there's no mention of the tenant's salary in this story. Does rent control in SF or the US in general not stipulate that rent control is also a function of the tenant's ability to pay? Here, in The Netherlands, this is an important criterion in determining what the maximum increase is in rent for a given property [1].

My general understanding of the law in The Netherlands based on having rented once during university is that it heavily favours tenants. The bottomline is that no one is allowed to end up on the street, with the main exception being if the landlord is in dire financial straits. Apart from that, the law sides with the tenant. This even goes to the extent that fixed-term contracts are more or less useless, because if a tenant doesn't want to leave, they don't have to.

Is it considered reasonable in SF that the tenant will be able to find alternative accommodation within 60 days?

[1] http://www.rijksoverheid.nl/onderwerpen/huurwoning/huurverho... (Laws on rental increase in The Netherlands in Dutch)

[2] https://www.jurofoon.nl/huren/huurovereenkomst-voor-bepaalde... (Fixed-term contract rules for housing in Dutch)

Re: “Your monthly rent .. shall increase from $2145 to $8900”

#182

Post by ghshephard »

I find it interesting that we can, with almost 95%+ success, determine who on these threads owns Real Estate in San Francisco, versus those who don't.

There are admittedly some comments that are in the margins, but the number of false positives/negatives is probably pretty close to zero.

In particular, those who rant about the evils of uncontrolled rental markets are 99% likely to not own real estate in San Francisco.

Therefore, those commentors aren't commenting on the objective good or bad of such issues, so much as they are just explaining what their personal situation is. As soon as those people who cried the evils of uncontrolled rental markets came into possession of San Francisco property, they would immediately change their tune.

Should we place any value in ethical principles which are so immediately seen to be self-serving?

Re: “Your monthly rent .. shall increase from $2145 to $8900”

#183

Post by cowsandmilk »

Sanddancer wrote: post #84
tmurray wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

property taxes are capped in CA, so the landlord's costs are essentially fixed: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_Proposition_13_%2819...

In San Francisco, the rent increase is also capped, oftentimes less than the amount that property taxes are increased under prop 13.

rent increases are almost always less than prop 13 increases. prop 13 increases are capped at 2%. In the last decade, only once was rent control greater than 2% and once it was 2%. The other 8 years, it has been less, including 0.1% one year.

http://sfrb.org/Modules/ShowDocument.aspx?documentid=1939

Re: “Your monthly rent .. shall increase from $2145 to $8900”

#184

Post by jsprogrammer »

WalterSear wrote: post #109
jsprogrammer wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Since when do people have a moral obligation to anything? I didn't claim a moral obligation. It is the market's prerogative to demand justification for a seller's price.

>It is the market's prerogative to demand justification for a seller's price. Bollocks. It's the market's perogative to meet that price or not meet that price.

It is the market's prerogative to do whatever it wishes, including demanding more information before transacting.

Re: “Your monthly rent .. shall increase from $2145 to $8900”

#185

Post by mmarx »

therealwill wrote: post #58

Here is the home: http://www.trulia.com/homes/California/San_Francisco/sold/71... Taxes are 11,043 with a value of 904,085. $2145 looks like an EXTREMELY low rent for a house of this size in San Francisco. (half of the rent is just property taxes.) The landlord was likely losing money keeping it rented at $2145 even if he owned it free and clear.

> The landlord was likely losing money keeping it rented at $2145 even if he owned it free and clear.

This conveniently omits the fact that there used to be two units in that house, so the actual rent would certainly have been closer to double that amount.

Re: “Your monthly rent .. shall increase from $2145 to $8900”

#186

Post by jsprogrammer »

clarky07 wrote: post #128
will_hughes wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What if the other unit needed to be knocked down for a reason other than to get rid of rent control? Let the owner give adequate notice to vacate (where I live it's 60 days notice without cause). But the rent-control limitation stays on that land parcel for some period of time after a new building is constructed on the site. Don't want to rent it? No problems. > Newly moved in renters realize that they are paying 1…

Why are all landlords assholes again? Why is making a profit evil? Do you sell your services for half of what they are worth just to be nice?

By definition, profit is extracting more than the 'worth' of something.

Re: “Your monthly rent .. shall increase from $2145 to $8900”

#187

Post by barrkel »

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #141
jsprogrammer wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the majority of owners don't wish to personally utilize their property and instead choose to extract rent from it, what exactly are the renters supposed to buy? Owners can apparently force renters to bleed ever more money, but renters can't force a squatting owner to sell, they just have to accept it or, as this letter exemplifies, GTFO.

> If the majority of owners don't wish to personally utilize their property, and to extract rent from it, what exactly are the renters supposed to buy? If you offer to pay at least as much for the building as the landlord would expect to make from renting it out then any rational landlord will sell you the building. > Owners can apparently force renters to bleed ever more money If they raise the rent significantly ab…

Rental housing can't be particularly efficient because neither renters nor landlords are fungible, and there's loads of information asymmetry.

IME (London) what typically happens is you get a bit gouged for rent when you first move in to a place, then, as the landlord gains trust in you as a tenant, the rent is "sticky" - it doesn't go up very quickly. You can use the risk of a new tenant as a negotiation lever to keep rent down.

Re: “Your monthly rent .. shall increase from $2145 to $8900”

#188

Post by phil248 »

kartikkumar wrote: post #181

So, there's no mention of the tenant's salary in this story. Does rent control in SF or the US in general not stipulate that rent control is also a function of the tenant's ability to pay? Here, in The Netherlands, this is an important criterion in determining what the maximum increase is in rent for a given property [1]. My general understanding of the law in The Netherlands based on having rented once during univer…

In San Francisco, only residential units constructed prior to 1979 are subject to the local rent control law. This is for market housing, government subsided housing follows different (and differing) regulations, which often do take income into account. http://www.sftu.org/rentcontrol.html

Re: “Your monthly rent .. shall increase from $2145 to $8900”

#189

Post by wmil »

vertex-four wrote: post #70
ghouse wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And up to 10,000 units in San Francisco are vacant because they think it's unfair. http://kalw.org/post/growing-number-san-francisco-landlords-...

If those landlords don't have clear plans to use the property, that is decidedly irrational.

Not really. The property quoted in the article was purchased in 1974 and California brought in strict limits on property tax increases in 1978.

So the property taxes are probably trivial. The house acts as an investment with high returns and favorable tax status. They can sell it or take out a mortgage if they ever need money.

Given that burning down the property to avoid a long eviction struggle isn't unheard of, the owner is perfectly rational to decide not to rent it out.

Re: “Your monthly rent .. shall increase from $2145 to $8900”

#190

Post by TheHypnotist »

mmarx wrote: post #185
therealwill wrote: post #58

Here is the home: http://www.trulia.com/homes/California/San_Francisco/sold/71... Taxes are 11,043 with a value of 904,085. $2145 looks like an EXTREMELY low rent for a house of this size in San Francisco. (half of the rent is just property taxes.) The landlord was likely losing money keeping it rented at $2145 even if he owned it free and clear.

> The landlord was likely losing money keeping it rented at $2145 even if he owned it free and clear. This conveniently omits the fact that there used to be two units in that house, so the actual rent would certainly have been closer to double that amount.

Judging by the series of downvoted comments in this thread, are you surprised? Apparently circumventing rent control is OK amongst the HN crowd.
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