Though San Francisco voters approved the residential vacancy tax known popularly as the “Empty Homes Tax” in 2022, the landlords lawyered up, and that tax on vacant rental units was just tossed out by an SF Superior Court judge.

Amidst reports at the time that there were enough vacant, flat-out empty apartments in San Francisco to house the homeless population eight times over, Supervior Dean Preston hatched a 2022 “empty homes tax” that SF voters would go on to approve by a 55%-45% majority. That tax charged anywhere between $2,500 and $5,000 a year for units that sat vacant for six months or longer, and would have gone into effect in April 2025.

It will not go into effect in April 2025. The Chronicle reports that the vacant homes tax was struck down last week by Judge Charles Haines of SF Superior Court, after a lawsuit from landlords and property owners claimed it was unconstitutional to compel landlords to rent their units.

Judge Haines did not detail his reasoning behind the decision.

The lawsuit was brought by the SF Apartment Association, the Small Properties Owners of SF Institute, and four individual landlords. “The measure seeks to coerce owners to rent their units by severely penalizing those who exercise their rights to keep units vacant,” their attorneys argued.

SF City Attorney Davis Chiu’s office argued in favor of the vacant homes tax. “Prolonged vacancy restricts the supply of available housing units and runs counter to the City’s housing objectives,” Chiu's staff said in filings.

The Office of the Budget and Legislative Analyst (BLA) estimated that there were more than 60,000 vacant units in San Francisco in the year 2022

Related: San Francisco Landlords Have Filed a Lawsuit Trying to Stop the City’s ‘Empty Homes Tax’ [SFist]

Image: William Bout via Unsplash