The number of evictions across the city have officially returned to dot-com boom levels not seen since 2001 according to new numbers released by the San Francisco Rent Board. During the period of March 1, 2012 to February 28, 2013, landlords filed 1,757 eviction notices with the city, compared to 1,395 in the previous year, marking a twelve-year high.
This does not necessarily mean that all of the tenants represented by those notices were evicted, as sometimes eviction notices are filed and rescinded during disputes. However, the number of ousted tenants is still likely higher than this, as the Examiner reports, because tenants often are given threats of eviction or financial incentives from landlords in heated markets like the one we're in, and leave of their own accord before an eviction notices is even filed. Of the 1,757 filed, 116 were Ellis Act evictions in which the landlord cleared an entire building for the purposes of selling it. But for every Ellis Act eviction filed, there are 10 or 15 illegal "Ellis Act warnings" given to tenants who ultimately leave, according to Ted Gullicksen of the Tenants Union.
We showed you this crowded Google map of 16 years of Ellis Act evictions, courtesy of the Guardian, last week. And as anyone in a rent controlled building knows, the possibility of such an eviction is a lingering fear, given how unaffordable any new housing will certainly be, with one bedrooms now regularly renting well over the $2,000 mark, and two bedrooms disgustingly expensive as well.
