The Berkeley Property Owners Association’s fall mixer is called “Celebrating the End of the Eviction Moratorium.”
A group of Berkeley, California landlords will hold a fun social mixer over cocktails to celebrate their newfound ability to kick people out of their homes for nonpayment of rent, as first reported by Berkeleyside.
The Berkeley Property Owner Association lists a fall mixer on its website on Tuesday, September 12, 530 PM PST. “We will celebrate the end of the Eviction Moratorium and talk about what’s upcoming through the end of the year,” the invitation reads. The event advertises one free drink and “a lovely selection of appetizers,” and encourages attendees to “join us around the fire pits, under the heat lamps and stars, enjoying good food, drink, and friends.”
The venue will ironically be held at a space called “Freehouse”, according to its website. Attendees who want to join in can RSVP on their website for $20.
Berkeley’s eviction moratorium lasted from March 2020 to August 31, 2023, according to the city’s Rent Board, during which time tenants could not be legally removed from their homes for nonpayment of rent. Landlords could still evict tenants if they had “Good Cause” under city and state law, which includes health and safety violations. Landlords can still not collect back rent from March 2020 to April 2023 through an eviction lawsuit, according to the Rent Board.
Berkeleyside spoke to one landlord planning to attend the eviction moratorium party who was frustrated that they could not evict a tenant—except that they could evict the tenant, who was allegedly a danger to his roommates—but the landlord found the process of proving a health and safety violation too tedious and chose not to pursue it.
The Berkeley Property Owner Association is a landlord group that shares leadership with a lobbying group called the Berkeley Rental Housing Coalition which advocated against a law banning source of income discrimination against Section 8 tenants and other tenant protections.
The group insists on not being referred to as landlords, however, which they consider “slander.” According to the website, “We politely decline the label “landlord” with its pejorative connotations.” They also bravely denounce feudalism, an economic system which mostly ended 500 years ago, and say that the current system is quite fair to renters.
“Feudalism was an unfair system in which landlords owned and benefited, and tenant farmers worked and suffered. Our society is entirely different today, and the continued use of the legal term ‘landlord’ is slander against our members and all rental owners.” Instead, they prefer to be called “housing providers.”
While most cities’ eviction moratoria elapsed in 2021 and 2022, a handful of cities in California still barred evictions for non-payment into this year. Alameda County’s eviction moratorium expired in May, Oakland’s expired in July. San Francisco’s moratorium also elapsed at the end of August, but only covered tenants who lost income due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
In May, Berkeley’s City Council added $200,000 to the city’s Eviction Defense Funds, money which is paid directly to landlords to pay tenants’ rent arrears, but the city expected those funds to be tapped out by the end of June.
you realize that after the mortgage is paid, you will have a fill house at your name and the tennants will still ahve nothing? Yeah you offer them a service but complaining that you have to work to pay the mortgage sounds SO entitled, to be honest. Of course you have to work to pay the mortgage, we all do! You might be a good landlord, but when people complain about landlords it’s usually about big landlords whho have several properties, not people that have a second house that they rent. People that say that “landlording” is their job.
If this is not you, this doesn’t apply to you and commenting as if you were one will only work against you,
I have a single second property that I am renting out.
Actually, I don’t even live in the first property that I co-own because prices are so high I had to buy an hours drive outside of the city where I work. I am renting in the city.
I’m not complaining that I have to contribute to the mortgage, that’s just how it is. I am fully in agreement that house-hoarders are bad, but there’s a big distinction between that and a general ‘landlord.’
I would argue that the tenants do have something, which is “not a life living on the streets because landlording was illegal and they couldn’t afford to buy construction materials and pay builders to build them a house.” I have rented all my life, I have never lived in a house that I owned despite having my name on two houses,
I get where people are coming from, but their argument is “ban all landlords” without any consideration of actual reality that involves having capital and taking financial risk to construct housing. There’s something to be said about having a system in place that incentivises those actions. Maybe it’s the system and not the actors that should be blamed? Hate the game, not the player.
You need to understand that context is important. It’s clear that they are not against people like you, and that as I stated, they are using the term Landlord more as a job title than as a status of owning a rented house. I have already agreed with your arguments, I’m just saying that if you present yourself as the term that people have coined for “house-hoarders”, then you are going to have a bad time, even if technically that term is being misrepresented in the given context.
You shouldn’t tell them that they are wrong on blaming landlords, because what landlord is for you and them is different, you should tell them to find a better term, at most. The better way to approach this would be to ask for clarification of what they mean with landlords, and while for sure there will be extremists, people in general will agree that what they hate is house-hoarders and landlords that speculate with property, not people that own 2 houses and rent 1 of them to help a bit with finances in a fair way.
Which risk? Any increase in taxes, mortgage rates and renovations are directly passed on the tenants.
At the end of the day, someone else if paying your mortgage because you could enter the market before they could.
And nowadays, simply having someone paying your mortgage isn’t enough. Landlords need to be cashflow positive.
I’m not complaining that I have to contribute to the mortgage
I’m confused, are you saying you’re charging less rent than the cost of the mortgage?
I’m not complaining that I have to contribute to the mortgage, that’s just how it is. I am fully in agreement that house-hoarders are bad, but there’s a big distinction between that and a general ‘landlord.’
There is absolutely little to none. No matter what you serve the same function, and no matter how “good” of a person you are, a landlord will always be a social parasite.
I would argue that the tenants do have something, which is “not a life living on the streets because landlording was illegal and they couldn’t afford to buy construction materials and pay builders to build them a house.”
mf lives in the confines of capitalism 🙄🙄🙄
And not just capitalism, but for you a concept of “social housing” seems to be absolutely alien. Vienna is an example of a western city that is a prime “fuck you” to this “argument”.
I get where people are coming from, but their argument is “ban all landlords” without any consideration of actual reality that involves having capital and taking financial risk to construct housing.
What fucking risk huh? What risk that any other person living in their own home don’t take?
“Oh the property might burn down.”
Mine can too fucker and you don’t see me complaining. The problem here is, your mortgage is being paid off by your tenant and who’s keeping the property at the end of the day? Not him that’s for sure!
“Oh but I pay my part!”
So If you split the payment, split the property too fucker.
If anything, the tenant takes more risk by renting because if he loses his job or sustains an injury he’s fucked because he has no property of his own he’s guaranteed to live in.
Sincerely, fuck you. I hope your tenant finds a better deal and that both of your properties burn down you entitled ass.
Oh and keep this in mind:
“The Maoist uprising against the landlords was the most comprehensive proletarian revolution in history, leading to almost totally equal redistribution of the land amongst the peasantry”
No, you are an investor who assumes risk of non-payment. Maybe you are a bad investor who shouldn’t be renting? In that case, you should sell the property to someone who is a better investor, possibly the actual occupants.
The tenant can’t afford to because rent seekers reduce the available supply of housing. If they can afford to pay you rent then they can afford to pay a mortgage, and the profit you derive from that relationship is representative of what they could be saving for a down payment if you weren’t leaching off of them.
You are part of the problem.
