[WSBARP] [WSBARP Digest] evictions, UD and available housing

[Andrew Hay]

While there is truth to the problem of individuals fleeing the renting market, I would say the discussion is less about horrible landlords owing poor tenants than it is about social priorities. I favor residential properties being owned and managed by individuals and families like Carmen far more than by the hedge funds and the investor class.  So it is sad to see individuals abandoning the rental market because of recent changes in the law and the growth of tenant advocacy.  However, I support both the tenant advocates and the recent law changes.

Some ridiculous proportion of our country’s wealth goes to one percent of the population.  Brookings says the wealthiest one percent owns more than the entire middle class.  By Bernie’s math it is 99%.   In any case, the wealth gap is ridiculous.  The wealth gap is a product of social policy – whether it be taxation, market regulation, and state and federal legislation.  Little is being done to change this and the gap is growing not narrowing.

The Landlord tenant-relation is a microcosm of this.  Landlords are invariably more wealthy than tenants.

Roughly half of rental housing in the US is owned by investment trusts or hedge funds.

Hedge funds and investment trusts make billions of dollars and pay little taxes – less than middle income people.  Hedge funds are essentially a vehicle for wealth to be taken from the 99 percent and given to the one percent.

So half the housing in the US is owned by the very vehicle that perpetuates and increases the wealth gap.

One a more narrow scale, the average monthly rent for a one-bedroom apartment in Seattle is $2,615.

Minimum wage is $15 an hour which creates a gross wage of $2500 a month.

The situation is not much better outside of Seattle.  The benefits of living in lower rental areas are offset by the high cost of auto transit, flimsy public transportation, and the stress and time loss of commuting.

It doesn’t stop there.  Homelessness is increasing.  People are homeless because they can’t afford rent, have been evicted and can no longer rent, or have life issues – addiction, mental health, etc.   Our social infrastructure to support this population has decreased proportionally over time – and the numbers of homeless everywhere are increasing.

People recognize the fundamental inequity of this. That has led to the changes in housing legislation that slow the pace of fast, cheap evictions.  This is a good thing.  I wouldn’t say it will stop the wealth gap from increasing but it treats a symptom of the wealth gap.  Unfortunately treating symptoms is not a cure for the disease, but it is better than doing nothing and therefore better than maintaining the status quo.

For people with one or two rentals, it is unfortunate that you have to abandon the rental market because you are better landlords than the hedge funds.  But you can always move into more secure investments like the stock market.  And find comfort in the 7% to 8% annual gains in that investment vehicle.  Ironically these returns are largely due now to the hedge funds and the wealth gap they perpetuate.

The people really suffering from the current changes in rental realities are renters.  The recent changes in the balance of power that favor renters are only the first of many steps that need to be taken to support that group.

Andrew Hay
Hay & Swann PLLC
201 S. 34th St.
Tacoma, WA 98418
www.washingtonlaw.net<http://www.washingtonlaw.net>
andrewhay at washingtonlaw.net<mailto:andrewhay at washingtonlaw.net>
He/him/his
253.272.2400 (w)
253.377.3085 (c)








From: wsbarp-bounces at lists.wsbarppt.com <wsbarp-bounces at lists.wsbarppt.com> On Behalf Of Carmen Rowe
Sent: Thursday, January 19, 2023 6:29 PM
To: WSBA Real Property Listserv <wsbarp at lists.wsbarppt.com>
Subject: Re: [WSBARP] [WSBARP Digest] evictions, UD and available housing

I'll short-cut my response rather than try to cut & paste the digest, other than this brief excerpt:


"Food for thought - the unlawful detainer statute was created for a quick and efficient way to resolve the issue of possession. It's no longer quick, it's no longer efficient, and it's no longer affordable for many landlords. Some are starting to consider walking away from unlawful detainers and just file full on ejectment cases because now they are likely faster and can resolve all issues more effectively than unlawful detainers can.
KJ"

Amen, Amen, Amen ... other than it's way beyond that, as someone else noted. Not some, but many, small housing providers are considering (and many have acted upon) leaving the market altogether. I did, and every person I personally know that had a rental property or two did. Those that had it for retirement quickly saw the potential for it to pull them down, not maintain them, and invested elsewhere.

The latest mess just showed that the government is plenty willing to "take" private property to serve the greater good (I know it wasn't technically a "taking" as it said tenants still liable; but the odds of a tenant that far in arrears having the means to pay it back? In I would hazard to say the very vast majority of cases, the words are just air, any judgment worth less than the paper it was printed on). Never mind the ongoing increasingly extreme tenant-protection laws (King County leading, but where KC goes, the rest apparently eventually follows). No cause eviction was the final straw for many colleagues & friends & family I knew who had rental properties. With the solid market, they simply sold. Which also allowed one of the few remaining options for a straight-forward end to a tenancy.

It won't get better. What used to be a viable secondary source of income (and sometimes, critically, a resource for retirement) just isn't anymore. And there goes a significant chunk of the housing market - which contained, by the way, the landlords who were likely the least of the problems the legislation meant to address, and the most likely to be accommodating/friendly/humane to their tenants, with whom there was a more personal connection by the nature of the person just having a few rentals. So you eliminate a significant chunk of the housing, and another chunk gets passed to the 'mass production landlords' who are the worse offenders.

I could not agree more with that comment that this is a horrible trend long-term for homelessness, so the purported protections will do great harm.

But I never seem to see any discussion on that. Only how horrible landlords are, how they "owe" it to the tenants, how they were somehow just living high on this side gig. Is there any balance to the discussion anywhere?


Carmen Rowe

[https://ci3.googleusercontent.com/mail-sig/AIorK4yaIwO8NwDh1yJGQWP1qK1vhwcBcK5yYclhzfMrEc3GuEfI5eiJ-wA30feUaQTq_2U2bQPszU4]

Phone: (360) 669-3576 (direct cell)
Email:  Carmen at GryphonLawGroup.com<mailto:Carmen at GryphonLawGroup.com>

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