An Emerging Coronavirus Concern: Eviction

I suggest reading the whole article at the following link, which dicusses how some locations in the U.S. and other countries are trying to address this problem.

Of course, even after someone is able to go back to work, if they couldn't pay their rent while out of work, it's going to take them awhile to be able to make up for past rent. For low wage workers, living pay check to pay check, it could be impossible.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/realestate/an-emerging-coronavirus-concern-eviction/ar-BB113FSv?li=BBnbfcN&ocid=wispr

Sarah Holder
Mar. 12, 2020

•••••

For many people like Hutchinson, the low-grade fear of getting the Covid-19 virus has been compounded with an urgent sense of economic anxiety. Under the states of emergency being declared in an increasing number of localities, large events have been canceled, public transit has been less crowded, bar and restaurant workers are losing out on tips and entertainers have had shows closed. In expensive coastal cities, where people can pay more than 30% of their income on housing, missing even one paycheck can mean falling behind on rent. And falling behind can mean getting evicted.
[Not just coastal cities.]

To protect low-wage workers from these ripple effects, two California cities, San Francisco and San Jose, are advancing legislation that would put a moratorium on evictions for people whose wages have been affected by coronavirus-related closures and work stoppages. Other city measures are geared at providing housing for those who are already homeless in the event of a virus outbreak. Already, Singapore and Italy instituted policies to prevent new homelessness during their coronavirus outbreaks.

•••••

Covid-19 is more deadly for people over 60 years old, who have underlying health conditions or who are immuno-compromised already. Nationwide, about half of the unhoused people are older than 50, many of them falling into homelessness for the first time after that point. In tent encampments, people live far closer together than the six-foot radius researchers say Covid-19 can be transmitted over; in shelters, people sleep on the floor head-to-foot. People experiencing homelessness are less likely to have access to medical care, and more likely to have weakened immune systems.

•••••

“The reality is a lot of landlords, especially folks who own rent-controlled units in San Francisco, are looking for ways in the law that they can evict long-term tenants who are low-rent,” said Preston. “And those are the folks who are most at risk here. We want to make it clear for these landlords that they can’t use this as an excuse [to evict.]”

California law is especially unforgiving when it comes to non-payment of rent, Preston said, allowing landlords to serve a three-day “pay or quit” notice. After the notice is posted, “if the tenant doesn’t pay in 3 days, the landlord can evict them, even if they come up with the money later,” Preston said.

•••••

Under Liccardo’s current proposal, tenants would have to let their landlords know they’ll have trouble paying rent on or before the day it’s due, and provide full documentation of the virus-related work outage or closure. “In our experience, it can be really difficult for certain tenants — especially folks that are working in the gig economy and have informal sources of income — to secure some of that documentation,” Trujillo said. “The ideal solution would be an unconditional moratorium: disallowing any eviction for nonpayment of rent during the emergency.”

Under Liccardo’s current proposal, tenants would have to let their landlords know they’ll have trouble paying rent on or before the day it’s due, and provide full documentation of the virus-related work outage or closure. “In our experience, it can be really difficult for certain tenants — especially folks that are working in the gig economy and have informal sources of income — to secure some of that documentation,” Trujillo said. “The ideal solution would be an unconditional moratorium: disallowing any eviction for nonpayment of rent during the emergency.”

•••••