[00:00:14] Speaker A: Well, welcome to the real estate and more show and thank you for listening. Today we talk with a fellow long term longtime real estate broker who cares about helping people and helping her clients whose rights, her property rights may have been infringed upon. It is a quest for all realtors who care to help their clients and others as this lady does. Our topic today is one very dear to the hearts of those who live in Concord, California. The Concord City Council has just passed a rent control ordinance, some of which was done without proper notice. We bring to the show this morning Ms. Jo Sharoni and wish her the absolute best this beautiful day and would love to hear her advice on property rights for the residents of Concord, California. It's her desire and a desire of other Concord residents to bring this important issue to the voters so that they can make their own decision. Welcome to the show.
[00:01:14] Speaker B: Joe Shimoni, thank you so much for having me. I really appreciate it.
[00:01:17] Speaker A: Geez, I've known you so long. It seems it had to deal with back in the day when your husband was working with my father and probably 30 years ago, maybe even more. But then we have had the great opportunity to work together with Remax and sure glad to know you and it's always a pleasure to see you. Well, in previous years, you were also a law student, were you not? And did you not love law and work in that field for a while?
[00:01:53] Speaker B: Well, it's funny, I was a single mom for a while and my thought process about the law, I love the law. I have always loved the law. But there was some family issues that came up and I had to make a choice because I didn't have enough time to do everything. And so I gave that dream up. I did attend, of course, law school for a while, but I gave that dream up but never did really get out of the law situation, which is similar to what I'm doing right now today as a compliance manager. I look at the laws, research problems and try to get those.
[00:02:29] Speaker A: Yes, we were speaking the other day with Jerry Stadler, the owner of Remax Accord, and we were talking about real estate the way it used to be, how the entire contract was one legal page and it was called a deposit receipt. Now that very same contract is 16 pages, the contract alone with associated acknowledgments and addendums and disclosures. So it's really great to have somebody with your background and your knowledge to help out people so that they understand, so their rights don't get trampled on. Well, let's just have a quick overview with what has happened with Concord? What is going on over?
[00:03:10] Speaker B: You know, rent control is big up and down the state. As you know, state of California has rent control as well.
Their issues are at least or their rent control items if you will, are at least manageable where apartment owners and so forth can manage that. But the main thing here is that they exempt one to four units, meaning single family homes, duplexes, triplexes and fourplexes. City of Concord has in fact a rent control ordinance right now in the books that nobody talks about where there's relocation up to 5000 for their tenants and other protections that have been put in place somewhat more along the lines of the state of California.
But a couple, maybe three or so years ago people that wanted more rent control came in and the council at that time because you know, the council members change and the council members at that time decided that yeah, they needed more. And so we're really working with the rent control advocates and then came up with what we have today which is pretty horrendous. I mean the people in Concord don't want to be Berkeley and they don't want to be San Francisco or Oakland. I mean they want to be conquered and have the right to make decisions about their homes and investment properties without two or three people. Well actually three people on the council making that decision for them.
[00:04:42] Speaker A: Yeah, that's not right. I remember an entire revolutionary war that began with taxes without representation. Decisions without representation seems to be happening here and many of the realtors at the marketing meetings that I've went to have all been up in arms about what this council have done. In my view, in my personal view, I'll step right out there and say they have overstepped on the rights of individuals and what you're proposing is simply to be able to give the right to vote on it to conquered residents. Right.
[00:05:16] Speaker B: Exactly right. It's not debating the ordinance at all. In fact that right to vote is for the tenants and the owners, meaning single family owners or investor owners. It's really the right for everybody to vote. So my intent was never to exclude the tenants because they have some valid things going on and I think that we should listen to those issues and help them if we can, but not to the detriment of those people who are providing the homes for them.
[00:05:45] Speaker A: Yes. I mean somebody has to pay for the actual properties to own the properties and those are of value. It's crazy. So let's start at the beginning, Joe and talk about what the Concord city council actually did.
[00:06:01] Speaker B: Well they had I don't know many meetings and I've gone to all of them and what I found at those meetings is he who yelled the loudest and had the bullhorns and whatever was more ruckus got heard. And those of us, if you will, on the other side, not that we're taking sides necessarily, but those home providers, let's call them, they're meek and mild, respectful and really got overshadowed by the other group. And so toward the end though, we got a little more vocal. And the fact that the one to four unit people were not noticed when I started putting things out on the social media, my emails, text messages, phone calls from people that I don't even know were saying what is going on? And I invited them to come to the council meeting. So the last two or three meetings were flooded with homeowners and home providers.
[00:07:02] Speaker A: That's pretty interesting. So let me just see if I've got a handle on it and have you explain what the council actually did. First of all, the residential tenant protection program was increased to increase the just cause protections. You can explain about that in a moment. Then the second one is to expand Concord's rent registry. The third one establish a rent stabilization program. Boy, that's a pretty name for something. That's really pretty ominous. So let's go back and talk about the residential tenant protection program that increases just cause protections. That one also, believe it or not, is pretty ominous when you actually take a look at it. What do they wish to do with that?
How does that work?
[00:07:50] Speaker B: Well, first let me just touch if it's okay with you, on the rent increases. They're limiting property providers to increases of 60% of the consumer price index, which is somewhere around two and a half, two and three quarter percent, 60% of that. So it'll be less than one or 3%, whichever is the lesser. So a property provider will be looking at that and thinking, I can only increase my rent one and a half to 2% a year. Not only that, but they will tell you that single family homes are not included in this rent ordinance, but truly they are. Now we have laws on the state level that prevents them from including single family homes in the rent provision. But the just cause provision is what's the most punitive.
[00:08:48] Speaker A: So if they wish to limit these rent increases to 3% or 60% of the CPI, I don't know. To me it just seems like government doesn't need to be here. They need to attend a government business and not get in the interests of property owners.
They wish to roll back the rents for multifamily rental complexes and mobile homes to April 4 of 2023 levels.
[00:09:18] Speaker B: Exactly right.
[00:09:19] Speaker A: Yeah. And then increase the scope of just cause evictions to force landlords to pay relocation and moving stipends to tenants for multifamily complexes and two or more units built before February 1 of 1995, even mobile homes that are rented out and single family homes and condos. Wow. And then they want to have you register any home that may be set up to rent, right?
[00:09:48] Speaker B: Yes. Well, they'll say most properties in the advertisement they're putting out. In essence, it's all properties that are rented, single family homes, all properties that are rented. And it's certainly going to be a nice chunk of money for the city.
Of course, they have to increase the rent registry, hire employees to take care of it all being paid by the city of Concord taxpayers in addition to those homeowners and those home providers. They're going to have to pay somewhere. I believe it's somewhere around thirty dollars to sixty dollars a year every year.
And then if they don't there are penalties for that. And if they don't they can't increase the rent at all. I mean when you really get into the weeds of the ordinance, it'll really wake you up.
[00:10:37] Speaker A: Well didn't it start out with eight pages and then suddenly it's morphed out to 36 or 38 pages of all of this verbiage to actually put it on the back of the landlords. And I'm not necessarily on the side of landlord or tenant. There's rights on both sides. But in this case this is just egregious at what it does to the landlords. Another part is that the city of Concord wants to review annually per this rent stabilization program. A little bit on that, please.
[00:11:14] Speaker B: Yes, there was so much pushback at the last meeting before they voted on it, and that was the March 5 meeting that they then flipped on that a bit and said rather than this being set in stone that they would review it annually.
Well what does that mean? I mean they're going to review it. But if the same people are on the council, the outcome is going to be the same, which means it's a moot point. They throw you a bone and then they let another dog eat it, so to speak.
[00:11:44] Speaker A: We're going to take a quick break. We'll be right back.
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[00:12:48] Speaker A: More now welcome back to our show.
Now, you know an interesting thing? Most people don't understand what just cause and how that works. Tenants can be evicted for no fault or at fault, just cause reasons. No fault is that the owner wants to move into the owner's property. The second one is the Ellis act, evictions, where the landlord is going out of the rental housing business. Third is compliance with government orders. That's also no fault. And the last one is intent to demolish or substantially remodel the unit. Those are no fault evictions. At fault evictions is where it looks to me it's a bit punitive to say the least. This triggers a relocation and now suddenly the relocation is ending up, per this ordinance, to be paid by the landlord, single family homes. Would you like to say what that one is? What does the landlord have to do if you.
[00:13:53] Speaker B: Well, let me just go back a minute. Just cause would be for good reasons. In other words, they didn't pay their rent, they violated the lease agreement, had animals when they weren't supposed to, whatever. So that would be a just cause.
If it is a no fault and you just want to take your property back, then that's a different situation. But the moving expenses are the ones that are punitive. And for a single family home, they did give us a bone on that one. They lowered it a bit and that would be two months of actual rent. So if the rent is 3000 give or take, then they would have 3000 twice or two months rent plus an additional 2000 moving expenses.
[00:14:38] Speaker A: Wow.
[00:14:39] Speaker B: Now nobody has ever helped me move. No. And the thing that's really interesting is you can give them that money and they can do whatever they want with it. So maybe they go on vacation. We don't know what they're going to do with it. We tried to get if you're going to do this some kind of a trust account where they would give you the receipts for whatever the bills were for moving and so forth. But that didn't go over.
Now on multi units it's a little bit more than that.
[00:15:07] Speaker A: Hear this.
[00:15:09] Speaker B: On multi units they look at the housing authorities index, if you will, and that could be.
It goes by one, two, three bedrooms. And if you look at a three bedroom just as an example, maybe the average rent on that is, I'm just going to use even numbers is 3000. Now you have to pay three months of relocation plus some moving expenses of 3000. So you're looking at maybe 10,000 in that regard. So you could be a mom and pop with a duplex and you've worked your whole life to have this little duplex to sustain you in your retirement. And now one of your tenants move out and you have to start throwing out 15,000 or maybe even 10,000 when they move. I mean, it's just not financially feasible for those Concord residents. It just isn't.
[00:16:00] Speaker A: So you're saying if the rent on a single family home was 2000 and it's an at fault eviction, then there would have to be a payment by the landlord to the tenant of some 2000. 2000 plus another 2000 you would be 6000 right there.
But yet on a multiple family home then it would be three times the published fair market rents.
Three times plus another $3,000.
[00:16:38] Speaker B: Exactly. And if they're 62 years or older or disabled, mentally ill or that sort of thing, then you have to give them four months rent.
[00:16:50] Speaker A: Man, that's pretty harsh. What about the other elements of this Concord rent control ordinance that the city council found in their wisdom to pass? What other elements are involved in that? It's morphed to 36 pages now. What else is in there, Joe?
[00:17:07] Speaker B: Well, the thing that bothers me the most, let's just take single family homes as an example.
Say you're in the military and you're deployed and you want to rent your house while you're gone.
Let's say you're a senior and you can't sustain the maintenance and whatever, so you're going to go to assisted living and you're going to rent the home, things like that.
If you go away and you want to move back into the home, that would be considered a no fault. They call it an eviction but it's really a notice to vacate. So they're convoluted those two things to make it sound worse, but it isn't. That means that's just a legal notice to move because I'm going to move back into my home. They would require you to live in the home. This is in the ordinance for two years. So once you come back and move into your home, you have to stay there two years or there are penalties involved if you move out.
[00:18:03] Speaker A: Oh my.
[00:18:04] Speaker B: Once you live in there for two years and let's just say you move within the five year period, again, you have to go back to that original and this goes on for ten years, by the way, you have to go back to that original tenant and offer them at the same rent that they were living there ten years earlier. Plus that little minor increase. If it's 1% or 2%, you can do that for the period of time. But that will never catch up to what market rent is over a ten year period.
And I can go on and on about those little.
The devil is in the details.
Some of this stuff is not in their. They call it stuff. Some of this horrible thing. These horrible things are not in their talking points that they're putting out to people. So all I can say is, please, you can go online if you have the ability to do that or if you want to sign the petition, we'll show you where to go get the information or give you a copy.
But the devil is in the detail. There's a lot of stuff in that particular ordinance that they're not telling you about.
[00:19:04] Speaker A: We're talking today with Joe Sharoni. She's a legal background. When this ordinance was passed by the city council of Concord, she said this is not right. And she actually put together a referendum applied to the city attorney of Concord which had to be approved. And now she's gathering signatures. Those signatures are not necessarily to repeal this ordinance that the council has passed. They're there to simply allow you as a resident of Concord the ability to vote on it. I would strongly suggest that you show up at the farmers market on Tuesdays and Thursdays. They'll have a table there to help you get your signature on this petition. I would definitely do that.
She is definitely an advocate for people. But it's got to be right, it's got to be just, it's got to be fair. And I've got a feeling that her italian background may be coming out in this one. Who knows? So we've talked about just cause. We've talked about elements of the rent control ordinance and we've talked about why this is probably not a great thing to happen, but let the Concord residents vote on it and you're collecting those signatures and there's a website being set up.
[00:20:29] Speaker B: Yes, we are setting up a website. That information will be out shortly. But if you go to your local market, look for us. We'll have canvassers out in your neighborhood. We're trying to hit it on all fronts. And really I just want to emphasize this is for all people who live in Concord and you're registered to vote just those two criteria. And when I say all citizens of Concord, that includes the tenants as well because we want something fair for everybody.
And I just got involved in this because going to all of these meetings, I could see that the city council had made up their mind long, long ago. And we're not open enough, which they're supposed to be, but we're not open enough to listen to both sides and make some fair decisions here.
[00:21:14] Speaker A: Sounds like a bit of overreach.
[00:21:16] Speaker B: Oh, definitely, yeah.
[00:21:17] Speaker A: Concord residents. Come on, guys.
Sometimes it's important to lift up your head and go through a little bit of a headache for a moment to protect your own property rights. So again, we're looking for people that will want to stand up, the registered voters and people that are residents of Concord to stand up against this and say, this is just not right, guys. So find that petition at the farmers market. Or you could go to the website as we talked about, will be set up momentarily and you can have your words known. And certainly Joe Sharoni is here to help, although she's a bit inundated with all of the people that are up in arms about this.
So probably be your best shot is to find that place at the Concord farmers market on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Talk with people, find out more, be involved a little bit. It sounds like a really great thing to do.
When this ordinance went from eight pages, it was originally eight pages. Now it's 36 pages. You know, any background on that?
[00:22:24] Speaker B: Well, the original rent control issue was pretty simple. I mean, it kind of followed along, I think I mentioned this kind of followed along more with the state and then it had some more just cause issues in it that the state may not have had a little more restrictive, but it was manageable, I'll put it that way. And it did not include one to four units. That is where when you look at the citizens of Concord, if this goes through, you're going to see some degradation in the city. You're going to see properties that they cannot no longer afford to maintain. When those properties start going in disarray, the value will start going down. And appraisers look at your surrounding neighborhood. And if the value of that goes down and people have to sell the house because it's going to go into foreclosure as an example, that is definitely going to affect the value of your home too. And that's home or multiple units. It really is.
[00:23:25] Speaker A: The residents at Concord who I've spoken with, they feel blindsided a little bit by their council. And this is another indication when the election time comes up to think about who is actually representing you, who is making these decisions without allowing the people that it affects having any involvement in the voting of it. It just seems like it's just egregious.
[00:23:48] Speaker B: Well, we did bring up the vote at the meeting and we said, look, if you don't want to listen to us, rather than have three people determine what, over 125,000 people, how they're going to be affected, why not just put it to those people and let them vote?
And they just flat out refused that. And I told them, what are you afraid of? These are the people who are being affected. What are you afraid of? Let them vote on this. And they said no. So guys, we're here and my mission is to get everybody signed on that referendum to give you the right to vote because that is your God given right.
[00:24:27] Speaker A: I have to tell you, having realtors look out after your interests like this is something that Joe and I know. We do this kind of thing, whereas some realtors that are not experienced, they haven't been around or they don't care.
We're of the vintage that we care and we're of that opinion. You're listening to our knowledgeable and respected guests. This is real estate and more. Our guest today is Jorone. She is a real estate broker extraordinaire. She's letting us know how Concord residents can ensure their rights are protected by being able to vote on a very important item. Listen to how you can ensure you have a vote on your rights in the city of Concord. And I'm your host Michael Hatfield. Well, Joe, if Concord residents do not sign this petition and you don't get enough signatures, what happens?
[00:25:18] Speaker B: Well, if we don't get enough signatures, then what they call the referendum as a failed referendum and the city ordinance will, then right now it's suspended because I filed that petition. Good to know.
And in fact it will be suspended until after, if we get enough signatures after it's voted on in November, so it will not be enacted. If however, we don't get enough signatures and the referendum fails, then that ordinance will automatically come into effect immediately and then the next thing would be to look at who you're voting for in your district that sits on the council. You can see who voted for them and who didn't. In fact, only one council woman did not vote for it. She said no, and we applaud her for her courage.
But anyway, the next thing would be to vote them out and get a majority on there that can revisit this ordinance at a future point and either overturn it completely, maybe go back to the original one, or just massage the two of them together. But the whole point is to make it fair for everybody.
[00:26:34] Speaker A: Let everyone have a vote on it.
[00:26:35] Speaker B: Exactly.
[00:26:36] Speaker A: So the current rent control ordinance, the city council of Concord passed and put into existence until it was suspended by the referendum, forgive me, is one residential tenant protection program to increase just cause. They wish to limit rent increases to the lesser of 3% or 60% CPI. They wish to roll back rents for multifamily rental complexes and mobile homes to April 4 of 2023. And they wish to increase the scope of just cause evictions to force landlords to pay relocation and moving stipends to tenants for multiple family complexes and two or more units built before February 195. Expand the Concord rent registry. They want to do that. You have to register your home for rent with the city of Concord if you have a property for rent and then they get to review what you're doing with it.
[00:27:38] Speaker B: Exactly. You have to notify them and send them a copy of your notice to vacate.
[00:27:44] Speaker A: Right. And then they say establish a rent stabilization program. March 5 voted to cap at a lesser of 3% or 60% of CPI with an annual review by this Concord city council. Another part of it is that tenants and landlords can file lawsuits without any hear process before a hearing office. That's expensive for either side. You try to keep it out of the courts. You try to get decisions without having to come on to the burden of the financial burden of going to court. And the rent increases cannot be banked. What does that mean?
[00:28:24] Speaker B: Well, that means if this year you did not raise the rents, then next year you can't add this year and next year together. So your increase is like a double increase. You can't do that. And you know what? The truth is that the home providers in Concord, their rents are under market, have always been under market. The council didn't even look at their own staff reports in 2021 that showed that and currently show that they just wanted to make the referendum worse. I mean, excuse me, the ordinance worse.
[00:28:58] Speaker A: So just to recap all you have to do Concord residents and voters is to go to the farmers market on Tuesdays and Thursdays, talk with some people there to help you and just put your signature on the petition so that you will have the right to vote on your own property rights. Concord residents do not have know they have the right right now to preserve your property rights. But if you just default and you find that you're going to go fishing and you don't show up to do something about it, then you're going to lose those rights. Anything in closing, Joe?
[00:29:36] Speaker B: Yes, we will be out in the neighborhoods canvassing. So if you see someone knocking on your door with a little clipboard, they're safe. Just go ahead and open the door and sign that petition. And again, whether you're a tenant or whether you're an owner, please sign the petition so you get the right to vote.
[00:29:53] Speaker A: Longtime real estate broker, former law student and crusader for real estate clients, Joe Sharoni, very well respected by her peers, has shared her concerns on what the Concord City council is trying to do to Concord property owners. I personally know Ms. Sharoni is a person who cares about others, in particular her clients. And thank you for being on the show. Joe.
[00:30:19] Speaker B: Thank you so much. I really do appreciate it.
[00:30:21] Speaker A: You're the best of the best. You've been listening to real estate and more interesting topics. Great people like real estate professionals who look to protect the property rights of their clients. You can listen to archive real estate and more
[email protected]. Slash radio that's michaelhatfieldhomes.com Slash radio. The real estate and more show is podcast on all major podcast platforms such as Spotify, Amazon, iHeart, Tune in and others. We'll be right back with our next special guest. Stay tuned.
[00:30:52] Speaker D: The views and opinions expressed are based on current economic and market conditions and are subject to change. Information on the show provided for illustrator purposes only and does not constitute professional or legal advice. Information from sources deemed reliable but accuracy and completeness not guaranteed. Michael Hatfield and the Michael Hatfield remax team have no liability for information discussed on the show. Consult with qualified professionals prior to taking action.
