Lily’s Diary
by Lily
September 18
Maggie was late for our lunch date at Westlake Joe’s today.
I didn’t mind. It’s the only place where a guy who is
even older can buy a woman of a certain age a drink at the bar.
After we got seated in the Cascade Room, Maggie confessed she’s
completely spooked by the recent accidents and criminal prosecution
on failing decks. As a result, she’s having the deck completely
rebuilt on a pair of flats she owns in Noe Valley. The tenant, instead
of being grateful, is asking for a decrease in rent based on a “reduction
in service” because he can’t use his deck while the work
is being done. I thought he might have a point, but Maggie says
that ever since a court decision in a case against the Golden Gateway,
maintenance work can’t be considered a reduction in service.
Attorney Nancy Lenvin (SFAA board member) represented them and successfully
proved maintenance is not a cause for reduction in rent. Of course,
if the place is uninhabitable, that’s another story. For once,
however, the property owner was not punished for doing the right
thing. Maggie says that if you’re contemplating a long-term
project that’s over 90 days, you should go to the Rent Board
and file a notice.
September 22
Hey, someone at MetroRent must read this column because right after
I said I was getting more response from listing my vacant apartment
on Craig’s List (free on-line bulletin board), MetroRent changed
its policy. Prospective tenants used to always pay for listings.
Due to a glut of rentals and a smorgasbord of free listings on Craig’s
List, tenants no longer have to do that. Now MetroRent is offering
an option called “sponsored listings.” Yes, this time
you and I pay, and the tenants get the listing free. Personally,
I think this is a wise adjustment to a very different market, and
I applaud the folks at MetroRent for their flexibility. The deal
is that you get your listing posted for 21 days for $25.00. Go to
Metrorent.com.
September 30
A neighborhood woman, who never saw a tree she didn’t love,
is waging a campaign against people who remove trees in front of
their houses in order to accommodate the construction of a garage.
Myself, I am pro-garage. Many of our buildings were constructed
before cars were in widespread use, so I don’t see that cutting
a tree down to get another car off the street is morally wrong.
However, this particular tree-hugger seems to have a good point.
Right now, you have to go through the whole complicated process
of submitting plans and obtaining building permits before you are
required to get permission to remove a tree. By that time you’ve
gone through so much red tape and invested so much time and money
that the tree doesn’t have a chance. In fairness to her and
all arboreal activists, shouldn’t the tree permit be required
up front?
October 4
I read about Supervisor Peskin’s supplemental unit legislation
in a recent issue of this magazine. In fact, I read it twice. His
proposal sure sounds like stealth “spot zoning” to me,
and it looks like a pretty good first step for converting San Francisco
into a third-world city. If higher density is the real solution,
I’d rather the Planning Department take a leadership role in
presenting a proposal that rezones certain areas citywide. I don’t
really think a supervisor should come in the back door with this
kind of legislation—especially if it gives opportunity to so
few but tempts so many to strain its legal parameters. To sanction
people with the space to build an extra unit and then maintain that
their future tenants won’t have cars just because they can’t
apply for a residential parking permit certainly stretches my imagination.
Also, to assert that simply limiting the square footage to 750’
will qualify as “affordable housing,” is to ignore the
reality of who rents new, market-rate studios. Add to these claims,
the supervisor’s denial that increasing the units per building
is not a zoning change, and all I can say is I have yet to be convinced.
October 10
My cousin Eva, who lives in El Cerrito, says that State Senator
Don Perata is taking a “close look” at Proposition 13.
He says it isn’t fair that people living next door to each
other with buildings of equal worth should be required to pay vastly
different property taxes. It’s true, of course. You’ll
recall that Prop. 13, passed in 1978, cut California’s property
taxes by 30 percent and then capped the rate of future increases
for those who owned property at that time. The cap is often used
as the reason we have rent control. Landlords, so the story goes,
promised to lower rents if the state measure passed. It did, they
didn’t. Anyhow, the next year we got rent control under Feinstein—a
very gentle version, however. You could raise your rents up to 7
percent a year and owner-occupied buildings of four units or less
were exempt. Now, of course, it’s much tougher and, more than
ever, we need a tax break. If to do so means raising some rates
in order to lower others, well, maybe the time has come. (Eva asks,
“What Howard Jarvis giveth, can we taketh away?”)
The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the viewpoint of the SFAA or the SF Apartment Magazine. A longtime rental property owner who reserves the right to remain anonymous on the grounds that her tenants might gang up on her, writes Lily’s Diary. Comments, corrections or ideas are welcome.© Copyright 2002.