Eviction Moratorium v Rent Reimbursement--new take

[Marc Winter]

The Governer Of OR has taken the following actions  

"On Monday, the governor said through a new executive order, residential evictions for non-payment and other no-cause evictions will be on hold until December 31, 2020.

“Every Oregonian deserves a warm, safe, dry place to call home,” said Governor Brown said on Monday. “Since the Legislature passed House Bill 4213, thousands of people have been displaced by massive and devastating wildfires, and the global pandemic continues to make it difficult for many Oregonians, including Oregon’s veterans and many families with children, to pay rent, through no fault of their own.”  (Credit KATU.com)

So by now, we all know the routine--it's not the tenant's fault they can't pay, so put the financial burden on the landlord.  We understand the rent is still due and payable, but even if the tenant does not pay, it will be up to the landlord to go through l/t court or other collections post-moratorium to sue for the money.  That is IF landlords get their constitutional rights of DUE PROCESS UNDER THE LAW restored.

Let's reimagine the process:  the state of Oregon pays the actual rent due from the tenant to the landlord as it is due.  Later, after the moratorium has been lifted, the state can collect the money owed by the tenant from the tenant.  

What?  The state can't collect?  No worries, just get a judgment against the tenant.  (Which is exactly what the State currently expects the landlord to do.)

To my way of thinking, that would be equitable.  

Your thoughts?

[Adam Martin]

This is what I have thought was fair all along. I can live with the thought that someone cannot be evicted because they cannot pay through no fault of their own but why do we have to be the one to bear the risk of non payment. If they want to take away our due process to regain rights to our property that's fine but we all know that these debts are uncollectable and once we can finally evict the lines will be huge. I suspect many of us are going to realize later down that line that it will be cheaper to just forgive these debts as an incentive for the tenant to leave. It is always easy to be charitable with the money of others but if they were really serious about providing housing as you said they would front the money to the landlord and then collect. They have the power to garnish wages, tax returns, and accounts as well and should know how to find the tenant to collect from. We are not all rich and I think many smaller players are going to be getting out of the mkt especially for SFH where house prices are way up with plenty of buyers. Overall I think the biggest winners of this mess are the politicians pandering for votes. Landlords are out money which is going to make them screen harder, require higher deposits, increase rents, or maybe just get out entirely which would shrink available housing or make it significantly harder to obtain. If the tenant does not have money now, which is hard to imagine considering stimulus, enhanced unemployment, and laxed unemployment guidelines, I don't know how they will ever be able to catch up and are just kicking the can down the road for financial ruin. At the end of the day I just want to get paid, I don't care if it is from the tenant, or some gov. program, but an I owe you doesn't pay the bills.