20 Tenants Protest Eviction From Mission Building Where Shady Manager And Landlord Were Scheming

[KamaAina]

http://sfist.com/2014/08/21/20_tenants_protest_eviction_from_mi.php

A shady situation has come to light at a three-story apartment building at 3150-3154 26th Street where about 16 to 20 tenants are facing eviction amid what appears to be an ill-conceived plot by the landlord and building manager to get rid of them all. As Mission Local reports, about 50 people gathered Wednesday to protest the unfair evictions — some of which were delivered by text message — and to draw attention to their case, which is an unusual but not unheard-of one.

As the tenants tell it, none of them have had proper leases with the landlord, Thomas Aquilina, and despite some of them living there as many as 30 years, they've all just been subtenants of property manager German Maldonado. They've had rental agreements with Maldonado and say they can all prove that they've paid rent in recent months, however the landlord has claimed non-payment of rent, meaning that Maldonado may have been holding onto their money.

According to the tenants and the Anti-Eviction Mapping Project, Maldonado and Aquilina have reached an agreement allowing Maldonado to stay in his unit, while removing everyone else.

As IndyBay reports, no proper eviction notices have been served, and some were just informed by phone or text message that they would have to be out of the building by 5 p.m. on September 2. No direct contact between the landlord and tenants has taken place, rather the landlord seems to have been using an intermediary — another property manager from next door in a building Aquilina also owns. They say they were told by Maldonado, when eviction notices briefly appeared around the building, that he was taking care of the problem.

[petronius]

1. That sounds incredibly effed up! Hope there's a proper investigation,

justice, and charges if appropriate...

[Auggie]

2. Twenty years ago a Polk Street merchant told me that if you lived in S.F. and rented ...

either as a business or as a residence ... that you would always run the risk of being screwed. As it it turned out, in a few years we both were.

[daredtowork]

3. Property Speculation is creating chaos all over the area

My housemate is blaming "quantitative easing": I don't understand his entire argument but while he agrees Yellen's policies are keeping the economy from going into another tailspin, he thinks the ultimate effect of pouring money into the economy from the top instead of from the bottom is to encourage speculators, which in turn encourages greedy people to sell.

(It also encourages Objectivist Super-Nerds to start regurgitating rightwing propaganda on Market Demand and Desire and how the losers should how move some place cheaper where they can "live within their means" no matter how long we've lived here or what our community ties might be...)

[KamaAina]

5. I doubt that Yellen's national policies are having any effect in SF

rather, it's the fact that no self-respecting $iliValley techie would bother to live in nearby, but bland, San Jose if s/he could afford The City.

[daredtowork]

6. That's the Demand Side

I think my housemate is arguing that Quantitative Easing makes it easier for Speculators to engage in property flipping on to meet the Supply side.

But I have to admit my understanding of economics gets really fuzzy after the level of "there are a lot of unemployed people", "wages are going down", "that CEO is making $10,000/minute", "the cost of milk and eggs just tripled", "I have zero savings for retirement", and "my rent is going up".

[KamaAina]

7. Your housemate sounds kind of like a Randroid

[daredtowork]

8. Not exactly, but... :X

He's an old (gay) left libertarian who worked with Hayek stuff before Hayek became the idol of Rightwingnutdom. I'm thanked as a research assistant in a book on Hayek.

Actually he's moved further left over time, though he's never going to be as socialist as me. He's voted for Democrats, while wishing there were another option, and he would be horrified to be described as a Randroid. We bag on Rand and all the time. But he is a hardcore realist when it comes to economics, and most of the conclusions he draws are way over my head. But, vaguely, he thinks Bernanke, previously, and now Yellen, is responsible for Wall Street getting too much money, for too much property speculation, and for rents going up in the Bay Area. If you ask me to explain it in detail, I can't.

[KamaAina]

9. He's right about Bernanke

the jury's still out on Yellen. Larry Summers would have been a complete disaster!

[daredtowork]

10. We are both disgusted by Larry Summers

Ever since Summers, as the President of Harvard University, claimed women don't have the same innate ability in science as men, both my housemate and I have thought of him as a prime example of scum rising to the top. Yet somehow he got taken into the White House as a leading Economic adviser! Unbelievable!

We also both approved of the choice of Yellen for the Fed. I confess to not understanding the ramifications of all this quantitative easing stuff. I thought it was putting money in the economy. I was surprised when my housemate made the argument that this was the ultimate cause of skyrocketing rents in the Bay Area.

I wish I could reproduce the argument. You would think just exposure to my housemate would have allowed me to, by osmosis, become an economics guru. But I'm really dense in this area.

[KamaAina]

13. I remember that

I'm a Yalie, you see. It pleases me in a schadenfreude kind of way to see Hahvahd people make asses of themselves like that.

[daredtowork]

14. I once dated a guy from Harvard

Or rather, I should say, I dated him...once.

He told me that telling women he went to Harvard was "dropping the H bomb."

I dropped him like a hot potato.

[KamaAina]

15. Sssssssssssss!!

So I guess I won't drop a Y-bomb on you.

[daredtowork]

16. rofl!

I would not be impressed. I'm packing my own academic cred - I don't need to worship at some guy's altar. :p

[KamaAina]

17. Let me see if I've got this straight.

You have academic cred, and a disability, so no decent job. I can relate. As it happens, I am an ad hoc member of the California Commission on the Employment of People with Disabilities.

http://www.rehab.cahwnet.gov/boards-and-committees/CCEPD

PM me.

[daredtowork]

19. Not sure whether this will make you laugh or make you cry

The ACA has complicated my situation - but a real job would certainly solve all my problems. I'll take any lifeline I can get!

PM incoming!

[TeamPooka]

4. Sure Manager, you can keep your apt. if you get rid of the rest, until I screw you too. - Owner

[mackerel]

11. omgeeeeee i used to live there!

I hated that place.

[KamaAina]

12. Tell us more.

This should be interesting.

[mackerel]

18. This would've been in the mid-'80's and I never knew who the owner was. I remember I always paid

by check but a lot of Latinos lived in the building and my husband told they paid in cash. He told the tenants who paid in cash
they were cray cray because even with a receipt it might be hard to prove you paid rent. I was actually not far from there a month ago and that area has changed soooooo much. There are way too many hipsters there now. The mission is no longer strictly Spanish speaking anymore.

Hipsters ruin everything.