Legal Aid Protects Tenants From "No-Cause" Evictions

Within days of the sale, the new owners of a four-unit building gave "no cause" eviction notices to each of the building's tenants.  The investors who bought the building planned to renovate all the units so they could be rented to new tenants able to pay higher rents.  

Suddenly long-term residents of the building had just 60 days to vacate their homes, a tight timeline under normal circumstances, but especially difficult given the county's high housing costs and low vacancy rates. With too few affordable apartments available, it's nearly impossible for families to identify a new home, save up for a security deposit and other expenses, and move. The families were facing the very real possibility of becoming homeless before finding any housing at all. Three of the households, all Hispanic families with children, came to one of Legal Aid's three weekly housing clinics for help.
 
Our housing attorney worked with the families to formulate a plan to keep them housed. The attorney was able to negotiate with the landlord to extend the 60-day deadline to move by an additional ten weeks, and forgo rent charges for two months so that the families could save their money for the cost of moving.

The extra time and ability to save some of their income not only prevented these families from needing to use emergency shelter services, but also gave each family time to relocate to stable housing. Although one family had to move to the East Bay, the other two were able to stay in the area and keep their kids in the same schools.

In these most uncertain of times, Legal Aid continues to provide our clients with the counsel and representation that they need to keep stability in their lives.

To protect client confidentiality, all client names have been changed.