More than 200 county tenants and their families whose landlords have fallen into foreclosure will receive a stay of execution under a new federal law signed last month by the president, according to a tenant rights group.
Under the Helping Families Save Their Homes Act, tenants have the right to stay in their homes after foreclosure for 90 days or through the term of their lease, according to Tenants Together, a California tenants group centered in the San Francisco Bay Area.
The bill also provides similar protections to housing voucher holders, according to Dean Preston, executive director of Tenants Together.
Preston said the protections go into effect immediately and expire at the end of 2012.
For the 1st quarter of 2009, there were 182 foreclosure sales on residential properties in San Luis Obispo County, Preston said. "This number does not reflect units, just properties, and some properties may be multi-unit," he added.
At least one third of the units going through foreclosure in California are rentals.
Under current law, most California tenants are entitled to 60-days notice of eviction after foreclosure. The new federal law increases this to 90 days.
"This bill will provide tenants 90-days notice of eviction, require banks to honor leases, and protect Section 8 tenants after foreclosure," he said.
Tenants Together runs a foreclosure hotline for tenants whose landlords are in foreclosure.
For more information go to www.tenantstogether.org.
FAIR USE NOTICE. This document may contain copyrighted material the use of which may not have been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. Tenants Together is making this article available on our website in an effort to advance the understanding of tenant rights issues in California. We believe that this constitutes a 'fair use' of any such copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the U.S. Copyright Law. If you wish to use this copyrighted material for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use,' you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.