Attorney and housing activist Randy Shaw provides an interesting example of an unprincipled approach to housing policy. In a piece titled “Upzoning and Rent Control: A Perfect Match,” Shaw proposes giving property owners a tad more freedom at the same time government is tying their hands. Upzoning is the process of modifying a city’s zoning…
“Just cause eviction” laws (sometimes called “good cause eviction laws) are, according to housing advocate Shelter Force, “a legal framework that requires landlords to provide sufficient grounds for any attempt to remove a tenant from [sic] through eviction….” Currently, four states and more than twenty cities have just cause eviction laws. While the details vary,…
On May 1, St. Paul’s draconian rent control ordinance took effect. The law caps rent increases to 3 percent, though property owners can appeal to government officials for a higher increase. In June, Dominium, a local housing producer, notified tenants in one of its apartment buildings that rents would be increasing by 7.97 percent. Tenants…
Housing advocates argue that when tenants are facing eviction, they have an unfair disadvantage. They claim that landlords are represented by an attorney nearly 90 percent of the time, while tenants have legal representation only 10 percent of the time. Providing an attorney to those facing an eviction will “balance” this power. But there is…
A recent article in The Los Angeles Times reports that “affordable housing” projects in California are routinely costing more than $1 million per apartment to build. This outrageous price tag is caused by both state and local policies, and it illustrates one of the costs of democracy. Democracy means unlimited majority rule, that the majority…
A report published in The Atlanta Journal-Constitution claims that landlords force renters to sign away their rights. The report details provisions in a standard lease that offer unattractive options to tenants and asserts that this is an act of force. The truth is, having to choose between unattractive alternatives isn’t force. As an example, the…
Atlanta has joined a growing list of cities and states considering a “Tenant’s Bill of Rights.” Contrary to the claims of the proponents of such laws, the proposed law is more accurately a bill of wrongs. Among the provisions in Atlanta’s bill of wrongs are: A right to counsel in eviction hearings Rent “stabilization,” also…
Atlanta has joined a growing list of cities and states considering a “Tenant’s Bill of Rights.” Contrary to the claims of the proponents of such laws, the proposed law is more accurately a bill of wrongs. Among the provisions in Atlanta’s bill of wrongs are: A right to counsel in eviction hearings Rent “stabilization,” also…
Atlanta has joined a growing list of cities and states considering a “Tenant’s Bill of Rights.” Contrary to the claims of the proponents of such laws the proposed law is more accurately a bill of wrongs. The councilman who introduced the bill said, “We all know that Georgia is a property owner’s safe place, but…
Prodded by students, last September legislators in Ann Arbor, Michigan, passed a law that prohibits landlords from showing properties or entering new lease agreements more than 150 days before an existing lease expires. Now the students are complaining that landlords are finding loopholes to get around the ordinance. They should have seen this coming. One…
In April, San Francisco’s “Right to Organize” ordinance went into effect. As is common, the law’s name is misleading. Tenants have always had the right to organize, and the ordinance does nothing to change that. What the ordinance does do is force landlords to negotiate with tenant “unions.” The law requires landlords to recognize tenant…
Mark Twain popularized the phrase “lies, damned lies, and statistics.” The essential meaning of the phrase is that statistics can be misrepresented to support a particular position. A recent report from Housing for All Massachusetts and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology is an example of abusing statistics. In the Introduction, the authors claim, This report……