Past Evictions May Prevent SF Condo Conversions

By Andy Sirkin
May 10, 2006

The San Francisco Board of Supervisors has passed a new law linking a building’s eviction history to its ability to be converted to condominiums. The main points of the proposed law are:

(1) A building from which one elderly tenant in occupancy 10 years or more, or one disabled tenant, has been evicted since 5/1/05 for any reason unrelated to the tenant’s behavior, can never be converted to condominiums; and

(2) A building from which two or more tenants (regardless of age or disability) have been evicted from separate units for any reason unrelated to the tenants’ behavior since 5/1/05 can be converted to condominiums only after 10 years of owner-occupancy.

The above restrictions will not apply to a building if each unit was occupied by a separate owner on 4/4/06.

Provisions of an earlier version of the proposed law which would have been retroactive to 1/1/99 were eliminated as too punitive.

The conversion restrictions will apply without regard to whether the current owner initiated or otherwise participated in the evictions. “Eviction” will be defined to mean the issuance of a notice terminating tenancy even if the tenant later leaves without further legal action (or in exchange for a “tenant buyout”), but if a property owner issues then withdraws the eviction notice prior to its expiration and the tenant receiving the notice remains in tenancy for at least 120 days following the expiration of the notice, the action would not deemed to be an “eviction”.