Landlord Rights Are Being Stripped Away—Why the Latest Examples of Squatting Should Concern You

The media tends to side with tenants and take a negative view of landlords overall. One notable exception was an episode of HBO’s , where the hapless Jared has tried for over a year to evict a nonpaying “professional tenant” who is currently subleasing Jared’s unit through Airbnb because California’s landlord/tenant laws are so biased in favor of the tenant that an eviction can take close to an eternity.

At the same time, Erlich (who rents the rooms in his home to Jared and the other characters trying to build the fictional tech company Pied Piper) is demanding one of his tenants and soon-to-be-supervillain Jian Yang leave his house (video contains NSFW language) and unfortunately lets Jared’s situation slip. This inspires Jian Yang to decide that instead of leaving, as Erlich requested, he would instead stay and simply stop paying rent.

While that episode was quite amusing, some municipalities seem to be trying to transcend parody into something beyond satire. New York, for example, just arrested a woman for changing the locks on a squatter in the $1 million home she inherited.

According to a New York Post story about the incident:

“[Adele] Andaloro claims the ordeal erupted when she started the process of trying to sell the home last month but realized squatters had moved in—and brazenly replaced the entire front door and locks.

“She said she got fed up and went to her family’s home on 160th Street—with the local TV outlet in tow—on Feb. 29 and called a locksmith to change the locks for her.”

Understandable, but not a wise course of action. The two got into a heated argument, and the police were eventually called. As the New York Post article notes, “Under the law, it is illegal for the homeowner to change the locks, turn off the utilities, or remove the belongings of the ‘tenants’ from the property.” The word “tenant” is an extraordinarily generous euphemism in this case.

What complicates matters more is that in New York City, someone can claim “squatters rights” after being in a home for just 30 days. But “’[b]y the time someone does their investigation, their work, and their job, it will be over 30 days and this man will still be in my home,’ Andaloro said.” So, that left Andaloro between a rock and a hard place:

Continued: https://www.biggerpockets.com/blog/landlord-rights-are-being...