The
following is an email I sent to the author of an article in the Los Angeles
Times about the problems tenants face due to evictions as developers buy
old properties and take them to a better and higher use.
Dear
Mr. Khouri,
I
would like to respond to your L. A. Times
article on Sunday, “Out of Rent Control.”
My
first concern is how you use the numbers in the article:
“…owners filed to remove
378 rent-controlled units from the market last year, 40% more than in 2012.”
A
40% increase makes it seem we should be concerned about such a large increase.
However, the total units being filed,
not removed, is only .0005924 of the 638,000 rent-controlled units. At the
current rate it would take 1,688 YEARS to remove all the units from rent control.
That’s about 24 lifetimes.
Next,
I am one of the mom and pop owners with only 35 units and 20% of them are under
rent control. One of my tenants pays only $450 per month for an apartment that
rents at market rates for $1450 per month. It is on MY back that this tenant is
benefiting by $1000 per month. Neither the city, state or federal government is
helping her enjoy decent housing. I am the one paying for that. Nowhere in your
article are you telling readers that landlords are the ones who pay for rent
control.
Next,
it has been proven by study after study* that rent control does NOT provide the
outcome of affordable housing that is supposed to be the point of restricting
the property rights of owners. Even Jerry Brown understands this and vetoed the
most recent legislation to reduce property rights.
Why
not push our government to take the actions needed instead of placing the
burden and economic consequences on the back of other citizens. Let’s ask our
government to put up the money to provide for decent affordable housing for our
citizens, all of whom deserve a decent and safe place to live. Isn’t that what
our taxes are for?
Please
try to write a balanced article next time.
Rennie
Gabriel
Rennie Gabriel, CLU,
CFP is a UCLA Instructor and the author of the award winning best-selling book Wealth On Any Income.
*Blair
Jenkins study; http://econjwatch.org/articles/rent-control-do-economists-agree
Rand
Institute: http://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/papers/2009/P4570.pdf
National
Bureau of Economic Research: http://www.nber.org/digest/oct12/w18125.html
And
many more
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