by Marvin Ramirez and news reports
22 tenants in one housemás: A private building inspector shows the filth in the house’s back yard where children live. (PHOTO BY MARVIN RAMIREZ)
As the state grapples with record foreclosures, more and more families are struggling to keep a roof over their heads.
As more families look at rental options, a wake of housing-related crimes has erupted throughout California. Scam artists, hoping to prey on potential renters, pose as landlords or as owners of a property, and post attractive rental listings of abandoned homes on the internet, according to statement by a state senator.
An unsuspecting renter meets with the imposter, is handed keys, and is asked to pay large cash deposit, completely unaware that he or she is about to become a victim of real estate fraud. AB 1800 will enhance the current misdemeanor crime of posing as a landlord to felony grand theft.
A press conference in Sacramento would introduce a bill on March 15, 2010.
The legislation comes at a time when tenants are being ripped off by unscrupulous people posing as landlords of rental units. Most of the time these victims are undocumented immigrants who for fear of retaliation or being deported, do not ask questions to the people they pay their rent to.
And exactly this is what is happening near by the Mission. According to tenant law attorney Phil O’Brian, 22 tenants were duped for a long time by a fake landlord, who took rent money from them, charged them for electricity and water, and if they complaint about the conditions of the unit, he would threaten them with the immigration service.
Gilbert Lee, the real owner, as the tenants found out was his name after denouncing their plight at San Pedro Housing, a tenant advocate organization, was not around for a long time. Instead, Marcos Alemán, who didn’t live in the unit but collected the rent every month, and sometimes demanded additional payment for another month, was the de facto landlord. He was able to collect rent for many months for years, while keeping the tenants under fear of deportation. Because he didn’t pay the electricity, the tenants live a week without the service. They also were prohibited to use portable heaters, while keeping a chain in the front door to lock them out if they violated the rules.
The house, located a block from Mission Street in the Bernal Heights district, it hardly has any space that is not transformed into a sleeping space. It’s hard to imagine how these 22 tenants and children can live as human beings. There is a long line to use the bathroom before they go to work almost at the same time in the morning. Only one couple living in an area of the garage has the luxury of having their one (portable) bathroom. To cook their meals in the only kitchen must be a nightmare. To accommodate to the circumstances, many have set up their own ways to overcome the limitation, which makes the unit an unhealthy and fire hazard place to live. The backyard is the filthiest place you can find, putting in danger the health of the children, not to mention the rotten sewer from which they drink water and electric wire exposed around the walls.
Two of four children of a couple had tonsil surgeries recently, and are having breathing problems in the windowless room, which the mother said smells like humidity and it’s hard to breath.
El Reportero will keep you informed about the legal issue going on between the landlord and the tenants, who have stopped paying their rent since approximately last November.
