por Marvin Ramírez
Community leaders join in protest with tenants who are on the verge of eviction and rent increase on 24th and Bryant streets. (photo by Marvin Ramírez)
San Francisco renters are very fortunate when it comes to rental legal rights. There are so many protections for tenants in San Francisco that when there is an opportunity or loop hole that helps landlords, judges favor them, according to veteran tenant lawyer Philip O’Brien, who talked to El Reportero.
Those fortunate tenants are the ones who live in units that were built before 1979.
It means that if the building or unit is sold, the new owner cannot raise the rent more that 7 percent, and cannot evict the tenant for purposes of renting it to a higher bidder.
In most cases, the tenants get to live in those units for many years or decades, at very low market prices and landlords hate it.
However, in the case of the unit located on 24th Street at Bryant, three of the four families who live in the building, are now facing almost a 100 percent increase, while the fourth family, has been asked to vacate their unit.
According to the tenants, the landlord is just taking advantage of the legal status of the property: is not under the City’s rent control ordinance. Therefore, the landlord can increase the rent up to any amount he pleases.
But despite of the lack of recourse these Latino families are facing, which not even a clever lawyer can beat, members of different community organizations stood up for several hours to protest what they call is an unjust eviction and increase of rent to these low-income families who have always paid their rent on time.
