The San Francisco Association of REALTORS® won a case last week when it challenged an ordinance by the city of San Francisco that requires property owners to wait 10 years before merging multiple units into one unit, if the owner had previously exercised the right under the Ellis Act to exit the residential rental business.
The Ellis Act is a California statute that, among other things, protects property owners’ rights to exit the residential rental business and prohibits local government entities from forcing an owner to continue to offer a residential property for rent.
The court found that the San Francisco ordinance penalized property owners for attempting to exit the residential rental business and that the Ellis Act overrides this local ordinance.
This is an important ruling for private-property rights because it impacts a homeowner’s ability to sell property where an owner has previously exercised the right under the Ellis Act to exit the residential real-estate business.
*Taken from the California Association of Realtors®
— Alec Bruice is a licensed real estate broker with Santa Barbara Brokers and the 2016 president of the Santa Barbara Association of Realtors. Contact him at alec@goodland-realty.com or 805.637.5774. The opinions expressed are his own.