Multifamily housing is often treated as if it were a quasi-public resource, for example by rent control laws. The degree to which apartments should or shouldn’t be so treated was recently addressed by a California court in Coyne v. City and County of San Francisco, which considered the limits on mitigation measures a city may impose on landlords for removing residential property from the rental market. When San Francisco increased the relocation assistance payments property owners must pay their tenants under the Ellis Act, the increase was challenged.
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