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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”

#71

Post by therealwill »

Russell91 wrote: post #21
whiteboarder wrote: post #13

Build more houses. None of this shit would happen if SF would just build more houses.

Ironically, rent control is exactly why there is so little housing available in SF. Iirc, only 30% of the voting population owns property. So how is it that the rest of us (70%) don't vote to build more? Well, because 3/4 renters are under rent control, and essentially don't care. So only 70%/4 Edit: source: http://www.quora.com/What-percentage-of-San-Francisco-apartm...

Exactly. Current homeowners don't want more housing because it will lower the value of their homes. They also vote against property tax increases for the same reason.

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

#72

Post by jsprogrammer »

nostrademons wrote: post #46
IgorPartola wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

OTOH, how much can you restrict the property owner? What if the other unit needed to be knocked down for a reason other than to get rid of rent control? Would it be OK for the law to tell the owner to fix it some other way? What if both units were destroyed in a natural disaster and a new structure had to be built from nothing? Is that still rent-controlled? Also, is rent control even a good idea? In the short term,…

Transaction costs. Moving is not free: at a minimum, there are search costs to find a new apartment and moving costs to pack all your stuff up and move it around. Very often, there are also storage needs, and if you move non-locally, there are jobsearch and job termination costs, recruiting costs by their employers, relocation costs, etc. Many of these are externalities - they're born by people who are not party to t…

>Transaction costs.

Agreed, the tenant likely has many bases for recovering any and all costs associated with a move.

When did the owner provide notice that they would attempt to evade rent-control? The tenant has a reasonable assumption that a rent-controlled lease will remain rent-controlled indefinitely.

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

#73

Post by [deleted] »

alistairSH wrote: post #52
charlesdm wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you own the building, i'd say you should be free to do what you want. Just because you rented out a unit 5 years ago doesn't mean you want to rent it out forever. You own the building after all. Imagine a building with 20+ units, you'd never be able to clear it out. But, that doesn't make it a fun process to go through for a renter. It sucks. Couldn't the owner just ask the person who is renting the unit to move o…

> Couldn't the owner just ask the person who is renting the unit to move out in a reasonable amount of time? Assuming the original $2145 is below market, the answer would be no, wouldn't it? Or, rather, they could ask, but the tenant would never willingly leave, as they are paying below market.

[deleted]

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

#75

Post by [deleted] »

DrStalker wrote: post #68
charlesdm wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you own the building, i'd say you should be free to do what you want. Just because you rented out a unit 5 years ago doesn't mean you want to rent it out forever. You own the building after all. Imagine a building with 20+ units, you'd never be able to clear it out. But, that doesn't make it a fun process to go through for a renter. It sucks. Couldn't the owner just ask the person who is renting the unit to move o…

Why can't they tell the tennet to move out? In Australia residential leases have a fixed term (usually 12 months) and after that become month-to-month, and the owner can ask you to leave with 90 days notice when you're not under a contract.

[deleted]

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

#76

Post by harryh »

jsprogrammer wrote: post #55
WalterSear wrote: post #26

I just don't see the news here. It's totally legal, and done all the time: it's why people lease houses rather than go month to month. It's not a reflection of the market in SF. This happens everywhere a landlord who isn't getting on with their month-to-month tenants and want them out, for whatever reason. It happened to me in 2005. It's not a necessarily a reflection of anything outside of the personal situation of…

Part of the outrage is that the owner is apparently being dishonest and provides no justification (and it's hard to imagine any reasonable justification) for suddenly demanding a 3x and security deposit increase. What additional value has the owner provided the tenant to justify such a large increase? If the owner wants the tenant out, the owner should say so, not hide behind some ridiculous attorney letter and extor…

Since when do people that own things have a moral obligation to justify their prices?

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

#77

Post by vertex-four »

cookiecaper wrote: post #56
vertex-four wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Rentals are for a limited time by definition. I know people (in fact, every branch of my family, along with many of my friends) who have rented their entire lives, because they can't own - they've never been able to amass enough capital or convince someone else to lend them it. Should they be uprooted every year (or more often) because someone wants to make a bit more money? Rentals are whatever the combination of…

>Should they be uprooted every year (or more often) because someone wants to make a bit more money? If they are living on someone else's property, and that person wishes to sell the property, and the lease and any other contractual or statutory guarantees have lapsed, then yes? This is really not a new thing. You can't do away with property ownership as a concept just because San Francisco is ridiculous.

Property ownership is an abstract concept enforced by law in the first place. There are theoretical economic models which do away with it to varying extents, or implement alternative ownership models. Why is it so mind-boggling to modify how it works in one specific instance?

Actually, almost everywhere, when you have a tenant, you lose some ownership rights already, by law. For example, except in an emergency, you generally can't enter the building without prior notice.

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

#78

Post by javert »

s0uthPaw88 wrote: post #48

This is a perfect example of why rent control is a terrible system that leads to market inefficiencies and worse outcomes for a community. The law has made it more profitable for this landlord to remove housing stock and charge market rate for the remaining unit than to rent out both units in the building under rent control laws. Cities with low vacancy rates like SF need to rethink their approach to housing if they…

Completely agree with you. However, I think SF has already ceased to be an attractive place to live.

I don't live there, so maybe it's not a fair comment, but I would not want to live there for the same reason I don't like flushing money down the toilet.

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

#79

Post by jrs235 »

tmurray wrote: post #11
Lewisham wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's sort of obnoxious and should be illegal to force landlords to keep renters ad infinitum just because. That hardly seems fair to the landlord, no?

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

Does California have income tax?

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

#80

Post by [deleted] »

tmurray wrote: post #11
Lewisham wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's sort of obnoxious and should be illegal to force landlords to keep renters ad infinitum just because. That hardly seems fair to the landlord, no?

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

[deleted]
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