Los Angeles Sides With Airbnb Squatter
As we learned when the CDC surreally decreed that landlords could not insist that rent be paid, we no longer enjoy property rights in the decaying remnants of the USA. Also gone are rule of law and shame. This state of affairs makes it hard to earn money with Airbnbs:
[Sascha] Jovanovic, who owns a dental surgery practice in Santa Monica, rented out his accessory dwelling unit via Airbnb to [Elizabeth] Hirschhorn, whose Airbnb stay ended in April last year, according to the [Los Angeles] Times. She hasn’t paid rent since.
The “accessory dwelling” is in tony Brentwood, Los Angeles. It should be worth $millions.
“When Elizabeth Hirschhorn’s Airbnb stay ended in April 2022, she simply didn’t move out. She’s been living there rent-free ever since, and she refused to budge unless Jovanovic paid her a relocation fee of $100,000,” the Times reports.
Extortion is apparently no longer illegal. But we still have plenty of rules. Welcome to the Kafkaesque world of moonbat bureaucracy:
Because of several [evidently trivial] code violations, the city determined that Jovanovic couldn’t evict Hirschhorn, whom he claims won’t even let him inside to bring it up to code.
According to leftist ideology, landlords are always the bad guys. So Big Government participates in the extortion:
Because she stayed in the unit for six months, Hirschhorn qualified for L.A.’s recently adopted Just Cause Ordinance, which requires a landlord to have a legal reason to evict her, and if there is no legal reason, the landlord is required to pay for relocation assistance for the tenant.
Looks like her refusal to pay and his desire for her to leave his property don’t count as legal reasons.
Pedro Gonzalez, the city investigator, also concluded that the unit is subject to L.A.’s Rent Stabilization Ordinance, giving Hirschhorn much stronger tenant protections.
No doubt the same government that negates property rights and refuses to perform the fundamental service of arresting the trespasser will insist taxes be paid on the property, despite having rendered it useless to its owner.
On a tip from Varla.
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