Articles Posted in Landlord-Tenant

Ask a group of people and usually at least one can share a horror story about housing, often centered on an awful roommate who was loud, never paid rent on time, or refused to lift a finger when it came to keeping the place clean. Some might also share a story about a troublesome landlord, but very few would rise to the level of a San Francisco couple who made national headlines and were dubbed “landlords from hell.” Like driving by an accident scene, the nation and our local community can’t look away from this story. At the Brod Firm, our San Francisco tenant’s law firm is horrified by this story and our team wants to remind readers that there is legal recourse for tenants facing bad landlords, including circumstances much less severe than those in this story.

Landlords Use Reign of Terror to Try to Force Tenants Out

A report in The San Francisco Chronicle announced a plea deal in the criminal case against husband and wife property owners who terrorized tenants in an effort to force them out of the South of Market property. In the course of this campaign lasting from 2005 to 2007, Kip and Nicole Macy rendered their property at 744-746 Clementina St. almost completely uninhabitable. A sampling of the Macy’s acts includes:

Sometimes legal standards are relatively strict – If a driver’s blood alcohol content is greater than 0.08%, the driver is legally drunk (though a lower BAC can certainly be a factor in finding a driver was reckless). In contrast, some legal principles do not have a strict definition, such as what renders a property legally uninhabitable. There is no strict definition of habitability under California law. Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart famously wrote, “I know it when I see it” in a case on pornography; a similar comment could apply to judging whether a dwelling is uninhabitable. In a previous post, we reviewed the overall contours of the implied warranty of habitability. In this one, we focus on just how courts and lawmakers have drawn the line between habitable and uninhabitable dwellings.

The Basics: California Civil Code 1941.1

The starting point for examining habitability in California is Civil Code 1941.1. This section lists a number of characteristic that a dwelling must have, declaring a unit untenable if the unit is “substantially lacking” any listed item. Still, the Department of Consumer Affairs is clear that the list just constitutes guidelines and only contains minimum requirements. Items included in the code are, in brief: 1) Waterproofing and weather protection; 2) Plumbing or gas; 3) Hot and cold water; 4) Heat; 5) Electric lights; 6) Clean property (at the start of the lease and in areas the landlord controls) and free from rodents/vermin; 7) Trash receptacles; 8) Stairs, railings, and floors in good repair; and 9) Lockable mail receptacle.

One of the primary reasons for the rule of law and the presence of courts is to help resolve disputes without resort to violence and physical intimidation. Landlord/tenant disputes are among the most heated conflicts that courts and lawyers see, not surprising since they involve the home, a place that ideally provides people with a sanctuary from the world. Our San Francisco, Oakland, and Sacramento tenant’s lawyer helps ensure that the right to this feeling of sanctuary and home does not depend on whether one owns or rents. We help ensure tenants are granted the rights guaranteed by the law and the terms of their individual lease.

Authorities Believe Arson Suspect Motivated by Lease Dispute

A recent headline in the San Francisco Chronicle provided insight into what can happen when a dispute between a landlord and tenant escalates to an extreme. On Monday, fire engulfed a two-story, single-family home in Delmar, Maryland, a town of just over 3,000 residents on the Delaware border. It took approximately 70 firefighters an hour to bring the fire under control and damage estimates are in the $40,000 range. The Office of the State Fire Marshal and the local police have arrested Andy Modeste, age 42, on charges of arson and attempted murder. Authorities believe that Modeste, the property’s owner, set the fire in a crawl space while tenant Eduardo Machado and his family were asleep in the home. The family escaped uninjured. Fire marshal officials have suggested that a lease dispute may have been a key motive in the fire.

There are some great landlords out there, but there are also some terrible ones. It is because of the latter that California law provides a number of specific protections for renters. This includes rights related to hazardous materials, rights that protect the health of California renters during their tenancy and for many years after. As a Northern California tenants’ law firm, The Brod Firm helps protect the right of renters to a safe, healthy home. In this post, we discuss four common forms of household contamination that can threaten the health of tenants:

• Mold

With the Toxic Mold Protection Act, effective in 2001 and codified in both the Civil Code and the Health and Safety Code, California was the first state in the U.S. to pass a law addressing toxic mold in the context of residential rental units. Landlords must issue written notice to prospective and current tenants if mold is known to exceed certain limits. Failing to do so entitles the tenant to file a legal action seeking reasonable compensation. Landlords must take reasonable action to prevent mold through common maintenance habits. If a tenant reports mold, landlords or building managers must respond in a timely fashion to maintain a habitable dwelling, making a reasonable effort to remove existing mold and prevent future growth. Failing to meet these obligations is deemed to cause harm and costs for the tenant. Notably, the law does not require landlords to test for mold. Mold issues require a complex mix between law and fact, making it essential that any tenant affected by mold seek counsel from direct experience helping tenants with mold issues in California.

California has long led the nation in efforts to protect people from the health threat of second-hand smoke. An article published by The New York Times on the eve of 1998’s extension of the public smoking ban to refers to “the biggest assault yet on cigarette smoking in the United States.” While these laws have allowed Californians to visit a range of public places without worrying about exposure to secondhand smoke, some people have continued to battle the health threat in their own homes. City living often means living in close proximity to others and also involves more frequent moves into new locations that may still have lingering traces of former tenants. Our San Francisco tenants’ lawyer is closely watching as the courts and regulatory bodies consider secondhand smoke in multiunit living areas.

Jury Awards Damages to Tenants Impacted by Secondhand Smoke

A recent ruling by a Superior Court jury in southern California, reported in the Orange County Register, held a homeowner’s association negligent for their failure to fully address a dispute between neighbors about secondhand smoke. In March 2011, Kim and Kai Chauncey brought suit against Bella Palermo Homeowner Association and TSG Independent Management, adding Lauren and Richard Lee Pulido, the tenants whose unit was next door to the Chauncey’s unit in the Trabuco Canyon condominium. According to the complaint, the Chaunceys’ neighbors and their visitors frequently smoked on sidewalk and patio areas, leading to the presence of secondhand smoke in the Chaunceys’ own unit and aggravating their son’s asthma. They allege that they complained but that no action was taken by the homeowners association, the management company, the condo owner, or the tenants themselves. Eventually, the Chauncey family felt compelled to move and rent elsewhere.

Hearing the word mold immediately brings about the connotation of something bad and unhealthy. Mold is a category of fungi that can be found both indoors and outdoors. Usually mold is either associated with old food or moisture in homes. It tends to grow in areas that are warm, damp, and humid, and reproduce and spread by making spores. Common areas mold can be found include bathroom tiles, basement walls, and areas around windows. Events that can cause mold to grow include roof leaks, flooding, heavy rains, and leaks in plumbing fixtures. Mold can be harmless for some, but can cause health problems for those more sensitive to mold.

Exposure to mold either through ingestion or in a closed environment can be potentially dangerous to individuals. For some, exposure to mold can cause no symptoms. For an unfortunate some who are sensitive to mold, exposure can cause nasal stuffiness, eye irritation, wheezing, and/or skin irritation and other allergy related symptoms. Continued exposure can also cause previously non-sensitive individuals to become sensitive or more sensitive to mold. In 2004, the Institute of Medicine (IOM) found that there was a link between indoor exposure to mold and upper respiratory tract symptoms in otherwise healthy persons. Additional studies done since then have suggested that there may be a link between mold exposure and the development of asthma in some children.

In an extreme example of mold in a rental apartment, a Sacramento woman found in December of 2012 that the mold was so bad in her apartment that mushrooms began to sprout from the carpet. According to Natalie Wise, the tenant, her apartment has experienced flooding six times in the two years she has resided at the apartment. The mold problem had been reported to the management at the complex and the carpet has been replaced several times. However, mold and the subsequent mushrooms have grown back each time. Additionally, Wise resides with her severely asthmatic 11-year-old son and claims that when she has reported problems of flooding, the manager has treated her with contempt.

In 1979, the City of San Francisco was facing a housing crisis. The Board of Supervisors and the Mayor enacted the San Francisco Rent Ordinance (the “Ordinance”) in an effort to alleviate the crisis. Today, the Ordinance (now available online) continues to protect the rights of tenants and ensure the availability of affordable housing. It applies to the approximately 170,000 rental units located in San Francisco buildings that were built prior to June 13, 1979. The Ordinance is one of the many tools that our San Francisco tenants’ law firm uses to help our tenant clients.

Rent Control

Rent control is one of the most important elements of the San Francisco Rent Ordinance. Under the Ordinance, Landlords may only raise the rent for existing tenants by a specific amount each year, an amount determined by a formula tied to the consumer price index. This year (March 1, 2013 through February 28, 2014), the maximum amount a landlord can raise a tenant’s rent is 1.9%, the same figure that applied to the prior twelve month span. A landlord must give thirty days’ notice before a rent increase.

Home should be a place of joy and comfort, a place to build happy memories and also a place to retreat from the outside world. People deserve to have the feeling of home, whether they own a massive house or rent a studio apartment. At the Brod Firm, our San Francisco tenant’s rights attorney helps protect renters from landlords who attempt to skirt their legal obligations. These duties are developed by both individual rental agreements and general California law. One of the most basic and fundamental of these obligations is the implied warranty of habitability.

The Warranty and the Concept of Habitability

As the name suggests, the implied warranty of habitability is a duty that is read into all rental agreements; an obligation implied under the law rather than one that must be explicitly included in the rental contract. The duty stems from a 1974 California Supreme Court ruling, Green v. Superior Court and is discussed in the California Tenants’ Handbook produced by the Department of Consumer Affairs (“DCA”). Pursuant to the warranty, a landlord must repair conditions that substantially impact the unit’s habitability. This includes repairing failures to comply with building and health codes and generally ensuring the unit is livable. However, the warranty does not make a landlord responsible for repairing damage caused by the tenant, guests, or pets.