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# Landlords and renters wage war on each other
- URL: https://www.smdp.com/landlords-and-renters-wage-war-on-each-other/
- Published: 2005-11-14T16:00:00.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-23T08:09:19.000Z
- Author: Bill Bauer
- Tags: Opinion, Mid-City, #archive-import

Real estate prices have gone through the roof. Savvy investors are coming to town and buying up older apartment buildings. Eager to see investments pay off quickly, many new landlords are determined to maximize their return, so they’re waging war on rent-control tenants who pay below market rate.

There are tenants who shortchange landlords by using subterfuge and misrepresentation to maintain their low rents. Santa Monica’s rent control law essentially says a tenant is not eligible for reduced rent if his/her rent controlled apartment is not the primary residence.

This newspaper reported (SMDP, Nov. 3, page 1) about a Santa Monica renter who lost her right to reduced rent when the Rent Control Board determined that her primary residence was actually a house in Simi Valley.

In a similar instance, less than two years ago, Patrick Davies purchased a five-unit, mid-city apartment building and occupies one unit. Davies told me that one of his tenants, a city of Santa Monica employee working with affordable housing, rents a $446-month studio, but occupies it only three nights a week and returns to his real home in San Clemente. So, Davies requested a rent increase.

Davies’ tenant fought the increase and, according to a complaint Davies sent to the city on March 30, resorted to harassing him by acting as a city building inspector and intimidating workers remodeling the property.

Davies’ tenant also complained repeatedly about lead paint. The Los Angeles County Childhood Lead Poisoning Prevention Program inspectors and an independent environmental testing agency retained by the tenant found only a very minor violation (on one downspout scheduled for replacement) after numerous inspections.

The county environmental health inspector even sent a memo to the city complaining that the tenant was “utilizing his position as a city employee to influence inspections on a private property and that in their department this would be a conflict of interest.”

In a letter dated Nov. 7 to Davies, the Santa Monica City Attorney’s office disagreed and opined that his tenant was just “uncivil” and “acted unprofessionally.” Davies will probably let the Rent Control Board determine an appropriate rent.

More often than not, it’s the landlord who abuses tenants to further their own financial interests. Some property owners are evicting tenants and redeveloping. Others are offering low-rent tenants financial incentives to voluntarily vacate. Less scrupulous landlords are harassing and intimidating tenants to get them to move out.

In the weeks ahead, I’ll be writing about a man and his disabled mother whose eight-unit building was recently purchased by a young Los Angeles busi-nessmen. The day he bought the building, the businessman made it known that it was going to market rate. By tripling the building’s rental income, he could more than double the building’s value — great incentives to get rid of low-rent tenants.

City Hall’s tenant harassment ordinance spells out the acts that constitute tenant harassment. For example, when a landlord uses lies or intimidation intended to make a tenant move out, tries to evict a tenant with false charges, refuses to accept a rent payment, eliminates parking, laundry or other amenities provided in the lease or intentionally disturbs a tenant’s peace and quiet or privacy — with malice — the city attorney’s office gets involved. But, such cases are often hard to prove in court and the city takes on very few of these cases and then only the most egregious ones.

Many low-rent and low-income tenants don’t have the financial resources to fight a determined, well-heeled landlord. A Santa Monica landlord group and its legal advisors are actively working with apartment owners to develop strategies for eliminating low income producing renters and maximizing rents — in addition to exploring ways to overturn the city’s rent control ordinances.

In future columns, I’ll also be looking at the City Attorney’s office, Rent Control Administration and Legal Aid to find out how they are protecting renters from abusive landlords.

Santa Monicans for Renters’ Rights seems to be more interested in building new affordable housing than protecting the existing low-rent housing stock or helping low-rent Santa Monicans fight the big money onslaught. I’ll take a fresh look to see what they’re really doing these days, if anything, to protect their base constituency.

As they say, stay tuned. (Bill Bauer is a longtime Santa Monica resident and a freelance writer.)

*Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on November 14, 2005.* [Read the original PDF.](https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/smdp%5Fbackissues/111405.pdf?ref=smdp.com)