S.F.'s answer to housing crisis: Offer loans to buy the buildings Novel S.F. loan program to aid low-income tenants

WWII Army veteran Anselmo Vinoya has lived in his building for 19 years and says he would have nowhere to go if evicted. WWII Army veteran Anselmo Vinoya has lived in his building for 19 years and says he would have nowhere to go if evicted. Photo: Michael Short, The Chronicle Buy photo Photo: Michael Short, The Chronicle Image 1 of / 4 Caption Close S.F.'s answer to housing crisis: Offer loans to buy the buildings 1 / 4 Back to Gallery

Faced with waves of seniors and other vulnerable residents being evicted as their apartment buildings are sold in San Francisco's tech-fueled housing boom, the city is going to start paying so some people can stay in their homes.

Mayor Ed Lee is rolling out a pilot program Monday, apparently the first in the country that will provide city loans to groups like housing nonprofits from an initial pool of $3 million to buy smaller, low-income apartment buildings.

The money is contingent upon keeping the units affordable and allowing the existing tenants to remain, according to program specifics, which were obtained exclusively by The Chronicle.

The program is designed to give nonprofits the extra boost of funding needed to compete for a building on the open market while making it financially feasible to keep rents low. It will target buildings whose residents, because of their low incomes, would likely have to leave San Francisco if they were forced to move.

"This is really a reflection of the need to stabilize neighborhoods," said Lee, who, along with other city officials, has been scrambling to address a housing crunch he has described as a "genuine crisis."

"There are sites that are under extreme pressure, and maybe they've been rent-control units for a long time," Lee said. "There are speculators out there who like to buy them up, evict everybody and turn them into profit-making ventures."

Owners can make sizable profits selling their old apartment buildings, where longtime tenants are often paying below-market rents because of San Francisco's rent protections, to speculators. Those short-term buyers evict the tenants, renovate the units and sell them at a huge markup as tenancies in common, which are similar to condominiums.

Those evictions, under the state Ellis Act, which lets landlords exit the rental business, have spiked during San Francisco's tech boom.

Ellis Act impact

Last year, the Ellis Act was used to evict tenants from 73 buildings that held 309 households, more than double the 120 households evicted under that law in 2012, according to figures the renter advocacy group Tenants Together compiled from San Francisco Rent Board data.

Of the 73 buildings cleared out in 2013, half were owned less than a year, and half of those were owned less than six months.

Many of the evictions have been in historically immigrant neighborhoods such as the Mission District, the city's Latino core, and South of Market, home to many Filipino residents. There's been an influx of tech workers in the two neighborhoods in recent years, partly because of Lee's big push to attract tech companies to the city.

Glenda DeVera is surrounded by real estate signs as she stands on the sidewalk in front of the faded Edwardian that houses the one-bedroom apartment she shares with her three children on Natoma Street.

Across the street, where a garage once stood, is a bank of modern condominiums the developer bills online as luxury real estate "perfectly located steps from uber-trendy SoMa restaurants" and "techie Mid-Market."

"Most of the buildings here, they were sold and the tenants were kicked out," DeVera said, looking down Natoma and pointing to a Victorian up the block. "The one on the corner, that was sold, too, and all the tenants were kicked out."

DeVera, 45, a Filipina immigrant who works part time as a senior caregiver, has lived in the apartment for more than 11 years with her children: a 21-year-old son who works the night shift at Burger King, a 19-year-old son who attends City College and works part time at a Subway sandwich shop, and a 14-year-old daughter who will start her freshman year at prestigious Lowell High School this month.

She pays $799 a month in rent.

"We cannot afford to move," DeVera said. "Nowadays, it's over $1,000. We're all low-income people."

Her downstairs neighbor, 89-year-old Anselmo Vinoya, a veteran who was a radio operator during World War II, says he manages on only about $800 a month. He has lived in the building for 19 years and pays $232 a month in rent.

'Fought for this country'

"I'm a veteran. I fought for this country," Vinoya said. Asked where he would go if he were evicted, Vinoya shrugged.

"I don't know, nowhere," he said. "I would have nowhere to go."

Fortunately, he and the other tenants in the five-unit building won't have to.

A group of nonprofits led by the San Francisco Community Land Trust bought the building in January 2013 for $754,000, in part by using a "short-term bridge loan" from a local investor, said the trust's director, Tracy Parent.

Despite four other bids, the building's owner was willing to take less for the property to allow the tenants to remain, Parent said.

"We did offer over the asking price, and the agent told us we were not the absolute highest offer, but we were high enough that the owner was willing to work with us," Parent said.

The city's loan program will work the same way, by providing gap financing quickly, city housing officials said.

"We want to compete in the marketplace," said Kate Hartley, a deputy director at the Mayor's Office of Housing and Community Development.

Funding under the initiative, called the Small Sites Program, would go toward the purchase of buildings with five to 25 rental units.

The guidelines specify that 75 percent of the tenants would have to make, on average, no more than 80 percent of the area median income, or $62,150 for a family of two.

The organization that receives the city loan would own the property and could raise rent between 2 and 3.5 percent a year based on maintenance costs - higher than the 1 percent increase allowed under the city's rent-control law, which is linked to inflation. The city could foreclose on the property if the new owner failed to keep the units affordable or otherwise violated the terms of the loan.

'We are focused'

The city loan fund will also be available for renovations on the building. A portion of affordable-housing fees charged to market-rate developers will provide ongoing funding for the initiative.

Other cities, including Chicago and New York, have programs in various stages of development that use taxpayer money to help buy affordable housing. Those programs, however, are largely focused on increasing homeownership and reducing blight in neighborhoods, rather than keeping people in rental units.

"This is really a new story," Hartley said. "We are focused on keeping residents in San Francisco and not letting them get displaced."