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Landlord And Tenant Quotes

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Landlord And Tenant Quotes

“Subletting may create a different problem for the tenant who sublets. Under some [rent control] ordinances, a tenant who sublets for a fixed term (e.g., a 3-month vacation) may not be able to evict the subtenant at the end of the subletting. This situation would arise if only persons with a specified record interest in the property have a right to evict for owner occupancy. The tenant (the seblessor) would not be able to evict the subtenant to reoccupy the premises, because the seblessor is defined as a "landlord" in the ordinance but not as an "owner." (If there is no other cause to evict, the owner-landlord could not evict the subtenant unless he or she planned to occupy the unit.) Counsel representing a subtenant should review the local ordinance to ascertain whether it defines a tenant as the "landlord" of the subtenant or if the definition of "tenant" includes any "subtenant." If so, the subtenant would have all the rights of a tenant under the ordinance. At least one ordinance specifically addresses this problem by providing that any landlord (not just an owner) may evict to recover possession for his or her own occupancy "as a principal residence" if the landlord previously occupied the unit and reserved the right to recover possession under the rental agreement. See Berkeley Mun[icipal] C[ode] §§13.76.040, 13.76.130. See also SF Rent Bd Rules & Regs §6.15C(1), discussed in §17.5. (In San Francisco, a well-informed tenant who is subletting will expressly reserve continued exclusive "possession" of some limited space so that the tenant can immediately enter on returning to the premises. Then, if necessary, and with proper compliance with the regulations, the tenant can evict the subtenant without cause.) It is unclear whether the Berkeley ordinance prohibits a landlord from evicting an unapproved subtenant and recovering possession, especially in light of the Costa-Hawkins Act (see §§17.1A–17.1G). If the landlord may not, then apparently the tenant who sublets may not object to further subletting by the subtenant. Such further subletting might, however, bar the tenant's right to recover possession. Berkeley Mun C §13.76.130 specifies that the right to recover occupancy must be in "an existing rental agreement with the current tenants." (Emphasis added.) A tenant who takes in a roommate by subletting must be distinguished from one who takes in a roommate with the landlord's consent, i.e., a cotenant. The roommate becomes a tenant of the landlord rather than a subtenant of the original tenant. In this situation, the original tenant has no right to evict the roommate. Only the landlord may evict and must have just cause [as defined by the ordinance] to do so if the roommate is found to be a tenant under the local eviction control ordinance.”

“The estate on which my Uncle Sandy had been a tenant was one of those on which the relations of landlord and tenant were spoken of as being on a paternal footing; the idea of its being a commercial relationship was strongly resented and declared to be the suggestion of radicalism of a very red type, only fitted, if not designed, to excite prejudice against the landlord class, whose distinctive benevolence forbad their ever going farther than to take what they wanted, and proclaim the grand old doctrine of 'LIVE and let live.”

“Everything seemed so clear to him now that he could not stop wondering how it was that everybody did not see it, and that he himself had for such a long while not seen what was so clearly evident. The people were dying out, and had got used to the dying-out process, and had formed habits of life adapted to this process...And so gradually had the people come to this condition that they did not realize the full horrors of it, and did not complain. Therefore, we consider their condition natural and as it should be. Now it seemed as clear as daylight that the chief cause of the people's great want was one that they themselves knew and always pointed out, i.e., that the land which alone could feed them had been taken from them by the landlords. And how evident it was that the children and the aged died because they had no milk, and they had no milk because there was no pasture land, and no land to grow corn or make hay on...The land so much needed by men was tilled by these people, who were on the verge of starvation, so that the corn might be sold abroad and the owners of the land might buy themselves hats and canes, and carriages and bronzes, etc.”