Problems of Landlords and the Rights of Their Tenants
I have read with interest the article concerning the Commodore Circle neighborhood in Huntington Beach (Nov. 10).
While I have sympathy and concern for the tenants’ situation and fully realize that there are negligent property owners and those landlords who take unfair advantage, I would like to point out some facts that may be of interest.
I am not an owner of rental property in Orange County and have no firsthand knowledge of these specific properties. I do have experience with similar situations in Los Angeles, where I have owned and managed property for the past five years.
- Your article mentioned that the residents of these apartments are “large numbers of mostly poor Latino and Asian families,” and later you state that 10 men share a two-bedroom apartment and that a family of 12 lives in no larger than a three-bedroom unit. Common sense tells us that too many people occupy the apartments. I can almost guarantee you that the landlord did not lease his units to such large numbers of people.
- Tenants not only repair their cars on the property or in the street adjacent to it, but often leave their disabled vehicles for weeks and months, which means the property owner is liable for any difficulties resulting from their presence.
- There is regular pest-control service at all of our buildings that began with a full clean-out spraying of the entire building when we purchased the property. Nevertheless, we still have complaints about cockroaches. We often find that the problem is perpetuated by tenants’ reluctance to properly and consistently dispose of garbage and their unwillingness to cooperate with the service men.
Uninformed readers might well ask why landlords do not evict tenants if they so flagrantly violate leases. It is our experience that to evict a tenant on any grounds other than non-payment of rent is a virtual impossibility. This goes for drug dealers and prostitutes as well as those who cause continuing disturbances, destroy property or merely violate occupancy clauses.
Expenses for utilities and maintenance have soared over the past three years. Insurance is almost impossible to obtain in some areas, and the rates have doubled and tripled. I can guarantee that a check of the Commodore Circle landlords’ income and expenses would show that these units are barely self-supporting, if that. Tenants think that property owners are pocketing all the rents they collect. Believe me, at $500 a month, no one is getting rich. In fact, with my knowledge of rentals in Orange County, I doubt there is anywhere else 10 men could live for $50 a month per person.
Over the past few years there have been several articles regarding “slum landlords.” During that time, I have not seen one article sympathetic to those of us who bought property as an investment. We had no interest in being slum landlords. We selected properties that we thought were structurally sound, had up-side potential and proceeded to try and maintain them properly, providing safe, clean, reasonable housing.
What we have encountered is destruction by tenants, harassment from public agencies, increasing costs, rent control and an image problem perpetuated by the media.
There are two sides to every issue and it is time the property owner was given equal time.
JUDITH C. DENDY
Orange
