Olympia council to consider more protections for renters and some homeowners. How they might help
The Olympia City Council is set to consider more tenant protections this spring and summer, this time aimed at homeownership opportunities and safeguards for manufactured homes and communities.
Housing Program specialist Christa Lenssen recently provided an update to the council on renter protections work and what’s ahead. The city last passed a round of protections in April of last year.
Tenant protections so far
Steps the city has taken so far to address the cost of living in Olympia include limiting the types of fees that can be charged by landlords and providing notices for rent increases.
State law requires 60 days notice of rent increases. In Olympia’s code, the city requires 120 days’ notice for rent increases that are over 5% at one time or that add up to 7% or more over a 12-month period. A 180 days notice is required for rent increases of 10% or more.
A landlord may not increase rent if they don’t respond to repair requests by the tenant to make the unit habitable, if the unit doesn’t pass the inspection required by the city, or if the landlord does not complete the inspection by the due date, Lenssen said.
Olympia also protects tenants from retaliation if they are asserting their rights under the city’s rental housing code.
Tenants were also given the right to install cooling devices in their unit, although there are some rules that landlords may set for safety purposes or to prevent damage to the unit.
Tenants also are provided an informational document that goes over the protections that they have under city code, and it has contact information and web links for resources.
The city now requires rental housing properties to register annually with the city, obtain a business license and undergo a health and safety inspection once every five years. Lenssen said staff estimates that up to 85% of rental units were registered in the program’s first year.
“When we were planning this program, we anticipated in our first year that maybe we’d have about 25% of units registered, so we are well over that mark,” she said.
Lenssen said staff are planning a community forum on the registry because of concerns and bugs the city has been working out with the process.
She said the rental unit inspections program is beginning this year, and they’ll start in the downtown area.
The city also requires relocation assistance if tenants are forced to move from their unit in certain situations. That can include if the unit is condemned, or if the unit will be demolished, substantially rehabilitated, or the use changes to a non-residential purpose.
Lenssen said to qualify for that type of relocation assistance, the tenant has to be low income, because the funds are split by the city and landlord.
Another type of relocation assistance is available for those whose rent is being increased by 7% or more in a 12-month period, and if the tenant decides to move out before that increase takes effect.
New policy proposals
Lenssen one new policy involves income-to-rent ratios and tenant screening. She said it’s a fairly common practice for landlords to require tenants to earn three times the rent to qualify for the unit.
“Considering that over half of our Olympia households who rent spend more than a third of their income on housing costs, it may be very difficult for them to qualify for a new unit if they were forced to move,” Lenssen said.
She said some landlords also require that each applicant earns three times the rent. That even applies sometimes to married couples or if people are renting with roommates to make their housing costs more affordable.
In the proposed ordinance, landlords couldn’t require that tenants earn more than two and a half times the rent in income, and tenants may decide if they use their combined household income to meet that ratio. If they have a single member of their household who’s eligible, they can be screened based on that person’s income source.
Lenssen said under state law, if a tenant uses a voucher to pay their rent, the landlord should only be looking at the tenant’s portion of their rent payment when they’re making these determinations.
“So these measures are intended to ensure that if a renter has to move from their current housing situation, they’ll be able to access new housing without paying multiple application fees and being rejected or being possibly displaced to other areas or seeking out more tenuous housing arrangements in order to find new housing that they can qualify for,” she said.
Manufactured housing
Lenssen said manufactured and mobile homes provide an important source of affordable housing, particularly for seniors, people with disabilities and those who are on fixed incomes.
“Preserving these housing options is an important part of our overall strategy to maintain affordable housing supply,” she said.
She said after the last round of tenant protections passed last spring, staff heard from some manufactured home residents who wondered if those protections applied to them.
“There’s a separate landlord tenant act for people who own their manufactured home and only rent the lot,” Lenssen said. “That’s called the manufactured mobile home landlord tenant act, and so our rental housing code doesn’t apply to those residents.”
She said staff held a community meeting last September to learn more about housing concerns and hear about the challenges these residents are facing.
She said the primary concern is rising lot rents and the risk of being displaced due to rising costs. A lack of transparency and communication with property owners is also a concern, as well as people wanting to be more aware of their legal rights and resources.
Lenssen said current state law requires three months’ notice for any rent increases for manufactured homeowners. Lease agreements are typically one year at a time, so every year there’s an opportunity for lot rent to increase, she said.
The proposed policy would require six months’ notice for rent increases of 7% or more, and if rent is increased by 7% or more, property owners would be required to offer relocation assistance if the tenant decides to move out rather than stay.
The amount of the relocation assistance would be the same as for other tenants, at two and a half times monthly rent. Lenssen said lot rents can be much lower than apartment rents, so staff suggested that the relocation assistance be equal to two and a half times the HUD area fair market rent.
Lenssen told The Olympian there are 750 to 850 manufactured homes in Olympia manufactured home communities.
She said staff are suggesting the city adopt similar language as in the rental housing code for information that’s included in rent increase notices about why the rent is being increased and the exact amount of the increase.
To address concerns about displacement due to redevelopment, staff suggested revising the city’s zoning code so that existing manufactured home communities may not be redeveloped to a different use.
Rent-to-own agreements
Lenssen said the city council directed staff to explore an exemption from the rental registry program for landlords who are willing to enter into rent-to-own agreements with their tenants.
However, she said staff found that there can be some significant risks to tenants who enter into these types of agreements, including being responsible for repairs and maintenance while they still have the same legal protections as a tenant. They can still be evicted like any other kind of tenant, and may end up buying a home that would have costly repairs that they don’t know about.
“They may find out that there’s a dispute over ownership,” she said. “I’ve heard of situations where the owner passes and then their child claims that they have ownership over the property.”
She said if those risks are mitigated, renting to own can provide a mutually beneficial arrangement and help more renting households gain long-term stability.
Lenssen said staff recommended that a home inspection be required to make sure that there’s no significant concerns about the home’s condition and underlying repair issues that need to be made. An appraisal and a title search would be required, and the city would have a qualified legal services provider draft an agreement and work through any concerns.
Tenant screening
In May, Lenssen said staff will provide the city’s Land Use and Environment Committee with some information about tenant screening policy options. Currently, she said tenant screening policies can include a tenant’s criminal history, credit history, rental history, employment history and income, among other factors.
“These screening policies can be overly restrictive and have disparate impacts on BIPOC community members, people born outside the U.S. and people with disabilities, making it more difficult for them to access housing options,” she said.
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