All Forum Posts by: David To

Damn, this is very terrible. I received this in my email inbox today.

Tomorrow morning, Tuesday, June 30, the San Diego City Council will be discussing another extension of the city's eviction moratorium...this time through September 30. With limitations on court operations, no evictions related to non-payment (COVID-related or not) can be pursued right now, and likely for several months. Property owners' and managers' sole recourse for encouraging residents to pay is unavailable. The unfortunate side effect of moratoriums like this and the court rules, is that many residents think they do not have to pay rent and are choosing not to whether experiencing a COVID hardship or not. At the same time, little to no relief exists for rental owners.

I'm going to wait till the end of July 28,2020 and see how everything plays out. Then depending on whether my property manager can evict the tenant in August, or at the very least file the proceedings, I would be out 4 months of rent by then. And it would take more time to actually evict the tenant so tack in another 1-2 months or so. My property manager will use their own collection agency to try to get all back-pay. But I would most likely use this URL 
https://www.findlegaladvice.org/guide-sue-government-california/
to hire a civil attorney to sue the state of California for all lost income / rent since the chance of getting anything back through a collection agency is slim.

I believe the California eviction moratorium has been extended to July 28, 2020 by the Governor so it's not 6/30/2020 like what you stated.

HI Ricardo, yeah. No idea how long these lawsuits will take and what the result will be. And if it turns in the landlord's failure, does that mean all CA landlords get to reap the benefits or only the particular lawyer or association that filed the lawsuit?

Royce, yes you are screwed, similar to me but more so. The chances of you getting all those months of rents in back-pay would be slim, since it will most likely end in a collection agency trying to get the money but a collection agency will get 40% of whatever they can get.

What we need to do is somehow find and get a powerful, influential San Diego landlord association together to file a class action lawsuit against the State of California and the Judicial Council to get all missed rent payments so that it doesn't have to go to a collection agency where there's no guarantee of us getting anything back or only 60% best case scenario.

What pisses me is that unemployed people in California can apply for unemployment and would have been receiving $4000 / month for the past 3-4 months which is more than enough to pay for rent, food, electricity, etc. Also, they could use their credit card to pay 50% of rent, but no some tenants simply not paying a penny and abusing the system. 

You are referring to this article? Well, based on what I read, it means we have to wait till July 28, 2020 in order to file an eviction so we don't have to wait an extra 90 days on the Judicial Council. Also, governor Newsom cannot extend extend it beyond July 28, 2020. So that's good news which means the most I'm out of rent would be 4 months instead of a potential 6 - 12 months of rent.

https://californiaglobe.com/section-2/lawyers-swift-action-forces-gov-newsoms-no-eviction-order-to-be-rescinded/

No updates from Pacific Legal Foundation yet. They haven't emailed or called me back yet.

I just also called Doug Michie in Ventura but got an answering machine so I left voice mail asking him about this as well.

Hopefully, they will contact me next week.

Thanks, Ricardo. I emailed Pacific Legal Foundation this weekend and hopefully will hear back from them next week to discuss if it's feasible to file a lawsuit or not. I'll post update once I hear back from them.

So I owe two homes that I'm renting out, one tenant is paying just fine but the other tenant owes me two months of non-payment and are not paying since she's been unemployed. If she applies for unemployment, she'd be getting about $4,000 a month in California, which is more than enough for the rent payment. But she isn't cooperating and I believe is abusing the system.

I wonder, what is better to do? With California's judicial council law, you have to wait another 90 days after the governor lifts the eviction moratorium (that means July 28, 2020 plus 90 days afterwards so we are looking at October 28, 2020). That's a potential of 5 - 6 months where the tenant doesn't have to pay me a single dime and will be squatting in my house for free. Not to mention any damages to the property I will have to suffer as well. And it could get extended to 2021.

What's the chance of me getting the rent back-pay owned to me? The tenant can simply delay and move out or get evicted in November and it could end up in small claims court if I want to get any money back or a collection agency will have to go after the tenant (and the collection agency gets 40% of anything they can collect on). 

Should I gamble on this or look into how to file a class action lawsuit against the State of California and the Judicial Council?

Any other people in California having these issues and would like to get together to file a Class Action Lawsuit or offer suggestions on joining local Landlord associations who are already looking to do so? Strength in numbers is the way to do anything about this. 

Do other landlords have problem tenants that are not paying as well?

Let me know your thoughts.

I wonder, what is better to do? With California's judicial council law, you have to wait another 90 days after the governor lifts the eviction moratorium (that means July 28, 2020 plus 90 days afterwards so we are looking at October 28, 2020). That's a potential of 5 - 6 months where the tenant doesn't have to pay me a single dime and will be squatting in my house for free. Not to mention any damages to the property I will have to suffer as well. 

What's the chance of me getting the rent back-pay owned to me? The tenant can simply delay and move out or get evicted in November and it could end up in small claims court if I want to get any money back. Should I gamble on this or look into how to file a class action lawsuit against California's Judicial Council? 

Let me know your thoughts.