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Since September, landlords have handed out 343 notices to Mountain View tenants that they had 15 days to pay past-due rent or potentially face eviction.
The surge in notices to “pay or quit” adds to a grand total of 535 written warnings since the start of 2020, according to city data. And while statewide protections prevent those tenants from being ousted, it’s the latest sign that hundreds of local families are still out of work and struggling to stay housed during the pandemic.
Reports from August found that more than 43,000 families across Santa Clara County are at risk of losing their home as a result of COVID-19 and far-reaching public health restrictions. Tens of thousands of mostly low-income residents have lost work since March last year, either through cut hours or layoffs, and are behind thousands of dollars in back rent.
A majority of the recent spike in notices in Mountain View are clustered in roughly a dozen apartment complexes, including Latham Court (61), Latham Apartments (27), 1939 Latham (22) and Americana Apartments (20). City housing staff caution that the data only includes rent-controlled apartments, and has been seen by some landlords as a necessary step during the moratorium.
The notices look scarier than they actually are, and don’t necessarily mean a landlord is trying to evict someone, said Emily Hislop, a program manager for Project Sentinel. State laws allow tenants behind on rent to submit a declaration claiming COVID-19 has cut into their earnings and, so long as they pay a portion of back rent by June 30, they will not be kicked out of their homes.
For some landlords, the 15-day notice is simply going through the motions, Hislop said. But it could also be that some tenants — treading water and barely paying off rent each month — have finally reached a tipping point and exhausted their savings.
“These tenants who we’ve talked to were using savings and borrowing to pay rent over the summer even though they were protected from eviction, and as the pandemic went on longer they could no longer pay,” Hislop said.
Regional nonprofits have reported that extremely low-income residents — or a family of four making up to $47,000 per year in Santa Clara County — have seen their income drop by more than 60% during the pandemic and are facing back rents averaging $5,000. Past efforts to provide countywide rent relief were inundated and oversubscribed in a matter of days.
The demand for rent relief in Mountain View has not relented over the last 11 months. Tom Myers, executive director of Community Services Agency (CSA), said they’ve received a steady stream of requests for help paying the rent, including some first-time clients who are just now hitting a point where they need assistance. The rent relief program — paid for by both CSA and the city — has now burned through more than $4 million to families, more than half of whom are extremely low income.
On the other side, the program appears to be serving a broad range of mostly smaller landlords, Myers said. More than 400 landlords have received checks from CSA, and 80% of those landlords have received five or fewer payments.
Myers said it’s fortunate the state passed eviction protections through June, but it shouldn’t be seen as a cure-all for pandemic relief. Families are still accruing back rent, and it’s going to be difficult for them to get out of debt and stabilize in the coming years.
“COVID will not be gone when the disease is over — we’re going to be dealing with the economic impacts of it for a long time,” Myers said. “We can’t rest on the fact that the moratorium has been extended.”
Since March last year, residents have been protected from displacement through a hodgepodge of state, county and citywide eviction protections, each with their own conflicting rules and regulations. Many previous repayment timelines have now been superseded by the latest extension under SB 91, which now requires tenants in arrears to pay 25% of back rent between September 2020 and June 2021. All other rent, including unpaid rent prior to September, will be considered consumer debt that landlords can collect in small claims court, but can not be used as a means to evict tenants.
Previous timelines included partial rental payments by Jan. 31, but the requirement was erased by the hastily crafted state legislation just days prior to the deadline.
More funding relief on the way
The latest round of eviction protections includes a long-awaited promise for comprehensive rental relief, fueled by federal funding and aimed at wiping out more than $100 million in current and future rent debt in Santa Clara County.
Under SB 91, California will be doling out $2.6 billion in federal funding that would go toward rental assistance. Santa Clara County is expected to get close to $130 million of that funding, dwarfing past rent relief efforts and providing a shot in the arm for nonprofits scrambling to help struggling tenants with dwindling funds.
At the same time, a second tranche of federal funding will go directly to counties and large cities, providing $27 million to Santa Clara County and $30 million to the city of San Jose. The expectation is that this money will be available for landlords to apply on behalf of tenants behind on rent, while the $2.6 billion funding package will be available for tenants, Hislop said.
Landlords won’t be able to use the program to recover all missing rent, however. Under SB 91, federal funds can pay up to 80% of unpaid rent on the condition that landlords forgive the remaining balance. The conditions are largely considered a compromise between landlord and tenant groups, with powerful lobbying groups like the California Apartment Association describing it as an important tool for struggling landlords to recover overdue rent.
The relief only applies to renters who make up to 80% of the area median income (AMI), meaning up to $112,150 for a family of four in Santa Clara County, and the bill calls for prioritizing lower-income families first.
State and county officials have yet to disclose where landlords and tenants should go for relief funds, with pending updates on the state’s website. Hislop said Project Sentinel and other nonprofits will know where to direct people for help later this month or early March.
