r/asheville • u/goldbman NC • Sep 10 '24
New law--HB556--passed by veto override prohibits local governments from passing any ordinance that would forbid landlords from refusing to rent to tenants whose income includes funding from a federal, housing-assistance program News
https://newsobserver.com/news/politics-government/article292183155.html50
u/wadonious Sep 10 '24
Finally someone is looking out for those poor landlords
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u/Mister-Marvelous North Asheville Sep 10 '24
Finally a win for the good guys!
Landlords are one of the most marginalized and hated communities in America. The discrimination we face regularly from the citizens, courts and governments across this entire country is egregious!
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u/NCUmbrellaFarmer NC Sep 10 '24
Economy is good RAISE THE RENT economy is bad RAISE THE RENT. Those poor bastards.
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Sep 10 '24
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u/g33may Sep 10 '24
They are easy targets given the ridiculous rents but people fail to realize the cost to own these properties, and stress and costs dealing with deadbeat tenants. Just hire a plumber to unclog a drain and see how that can eat up a months rent alone. The real problem is skyrocketing house prices and huge inflation on everything the past several years. Just my opinion.
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u/Qbnss Sep 10 '24
Ah, the valuable service of calling someone to fix a problem, I see the added value
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u/Mortonsbrand Native Sep 10 '24
High demand and limited supply.
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u/g33may Sep 10 '24
It's country wide. Where is the demand coming from?
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u/Mortonsbrand Native Sep 10 '24
In Asheville? Seems largely from Floridians moving away, and people from other “blue” cities moving to the mountains.
Also, while the supply of housing has not kept pace with demand broadly across the country, there are a lot of places where it is no where as acute as it is in Asheville/WNC.
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u/g33may Sep 10 '24
I thought the birth rate had been declining for decades now. I would think as boomers die off there would be a flood of available homes. Where are all the people coming from (demand)? Too many people owning more than 1 home(supply)? It just doesn't add up in my mind. Surely Covid took out millions 🤔🤔
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u/Mortonsbrand Native Sep 10 '24
I don’t have all the answers to that on hand. Millennials and Gen Z have both come pretty close to being at the replacement rate for birth rates, so while there is a long term population decline, it should be pretty slight for the rest of our lives.
All of that to say there isn’t really a huge demand cliff that is coming with the deaths of the boomers. Some of it may be due to them owning multiple homes, but in many cases those that do own multiple homes are using them as rentals rather than vacation homes which keeps them in the housing supply.
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Sep 10 '24
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u/Caitliente Sep 10 '24
Wait, so I’m having comprehension issues here. Isn’t this good? This prohibits local governments from writing laws that would allow landlords to deny taking housing vouchers?
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u/puckman13 Sep 10 '24
Nope, what passed prohibits local governments from forcing landlords to participate in voucher programs. Which AFAIK is the current state of affairs - so no real change, just prohibiting future changes.
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u/Caitliente Sep 10 '24
Gotcha. Thank you for breaking it down. All those double negatives had my head spinning.
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u/mojotoodopebish Sep 10 '24
I'm so glad you asked for clarification because I had no idea wtf I was reading
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u/SarahsDoingStuff Sep 10 '24
Yeah, there’s a triple negative in there, and it’s hella confusing. I have to imagine it could’ve been worded better.
Puckman already responded, but really all you need to know is the Republican super majority passed a shitty bill. Gov. Cooper vetoed it and then said super majority played a draw four reverse on his reverse. Bunch of ghouls.
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u/Caitliente Sep 10 '24
You should have written the bill because I understood all of that. Thank you!
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u/Illustrious_Can3214 Sep 11 '24
It's good because landlords bought a property and should be able to deny taking housing vouchers, etc
Anyone wanting to rent apartments accepting vouchers, can simply purchase property and do it.
They shouldn't be forced to accept vouchers. So yeah very good 👍
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u/bokehtoast North Asheville Sep 10 '24
They really just don't want poor people in Asheville at all.
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u/OkCommunity1625 Sep 10 '24
Just incase anyone else had to read several times
State government is making sure that landlords are ABLE to DENY tenants who use federal housing assistance money. They are doing this by passing a law which bans local governments from passing any laws that would restrict landlords from doing so
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u/Illustrious_Can3214 Sep 11 '24
This is good. Landlords should be able to decide who they rent to. After all, they worked hard and bought the property.
Anyone wanting to rent to just anyone can simply buy a house and do the same.
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u/leaky_eddie Sep 10 '24
Help me understand this: If I have a house that I want to rent, I'm going to advertise it, interview potential renters and choose to rent my house to whoever I want. I don't have to tell someone why I made the decision. If I keep my reasons to myself, how will you apply this law or any other rental discrimination law?
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u/Mister-Marvelous North Asheville Sep 10 '24
Some states have laws requiring you to write a rejection letter which is where it gets tricky. Otherwise you’re correct and the way most people are just simply told sorry we had a more qualified applicant than you.
Believe it or not there’s groups out there who purposefully contact landlords and property managers looking to create a violation of the Fair Housing Act.
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u/lightning_whirler Sep 10 '24
There's also the appearance of discriminating. Suppose you own an apartment building with twelve units, all rented in a price range the would be covered by Section 8, but none of your tenants are receiving rent assistance. You are obviously a criminal and must be punished.
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u/usernamechecks321 Sep 10 '24
Limited government at its finest.
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u/WishFew7622 Sep 10 '24
Literally it’s not. The state government is interfering with local government.
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u/lightning_whirler Sep 10 '24
That's exactly what's happening here. Local governments can't dictate how private citizens use their private property. Bernie would be angry.
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u/usernamechecks321 Sep 10 '24
Actually they can, and to an extent, should. Home rule should be a thing.
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u/lightning_whirler Sep 10 '24
Home rule exists in the context of state law, which tends to side with private property rights.
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u/sabotabo Sep 10 '24
prohibits loval governments... from forbidding landlords... from refusing to rent....
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u/goldbman NC Sep 10 '24
I wonder how this will affect our unhoused rate? Though in a high demand area such as ours, the landlords can probably just choose tenants that don't rely on housing assistance.
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u/Mortonsbrand Native Sep 10 '24
Since it doesn’t change anything from the current status quo, shouldn’t impact it one way or another.
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u/goldbman NC Sep 10 '24
Yeah, admittedly I had Orange County on my mind because I always saw those ads about housing discrimination while riding the bus.
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u/puckman13 Sep 10 '24
It shouldn't, because there aren't any local regulations forcing landlords to participate in voucher programs. This just means you can't change that current state without changes in state law.
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u/MellerFeller Sep 10 '24
Many prospective tenants lose their section 8 housing option from inability to secure a lease in time, so of course it has and will continue to contribute to the rate of homelessness. This is what Republicans want.
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u/Dear_Bullfrog_2661 Sep 12 '24
Why not just stop with all this gang crap. Republican vs Democrat. It's all the same. Gang mentality. (You ain't wit us yer againus!) We need to all look long and hard at what both sides are doing and stop playing the game of watching them dangling keys in front of us while the rest of them sneak in to the movie theater while we're distracted. I get so tired of seeing people go... "Yer a dumb because yous a Republican." Or "Your a stupid because you a Democrat."
People... You need to all grow up and start holding the actual people at fault. Not a party. Because the way I see it. Both parties are complete trash fires. You have a woman pretending to be something she isn't because it furthers her narrative. And you have a man who talks a lot and yells a lot and people praise him. (Yes. I could say more about both because both choices are trash fires. There hasn't been a good president in decades and decades. Each one has glaring flaws and good things too. Everything the opposing party does isn't always wrong or bad. But hate is so instilled in some people that it just makes all the ugly come out and they hate what that person does no matter what they do.) So, stop hatin! It's time to put aside all the BS and just be people, neighbors, Americans...
We get absolutely no where fighting each other. Because it's pointless, stupid, and only makes everyone upset and accomplishes nothing.
Now, I don't care if you downvote, because I don't care about votes at all. Upvote, downvote, who cares.
If you do nothing it's almost as bad as if you commited the crime yourself. So, stop blaming each other for whatever they vote for. It's not right. It's actually pretty hypocritical! (And dare I say... Racist? People seem to love throwing that word around. Or should the word be biggotted? Nazi? All the bad buzzwords. ) Most people would. But stop to think for yourselves. Turn off the news, stop watching things that will upset you just so you can fight someone about something that no one should care about. We should look more in to why Senator's make millions of dollars in office. We should look more at the house and Senate. The president has and always will be (since the 1930s) a figure head. A scape goat for the party they represent.
You'd think this all would be common knowledge, but common knowledge isn't as common as it used to be.
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u/glenda-goodwitch Sep 12 '24
I have friends who utilize section 8.
The landlord is a slum lord. They refuse to fix a drain field with "it would cost 30k to fix it." They knew a giant tree was dangerous. A limb the size of a tree itself fell across two cars. One of the cars was totaled. (No choice but to replace a car, instead of just cutting the tree)
The management company then has the cajones to send out a letter telling them to take one shower per day, don't flush paper, etc. One of the ladies is trying to make it work by taking sponge baths.
This law will just allow this garbage human to keep shuffling until he finds more suckers. People who can't say anything or they can hit the bricks.
She said section 8 has seen the plumbing issues and still signs off.
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u/Regular_Card_9089 Sep 13 '24
Do away with government subsidies. Socialism is only getting bigger and at some point full blown Marxism will have run of the place.
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u/Exciting-Source-3449 Sep 14 '24
Sadly the ones who keep voting for these folks fail to recognize they are actually voting against their own self interest and instead look to blame the Democrats instead of looking into the mirror. Its maddening but unfortunately its the reality we now find ourselves dealing with on a daily basis.
You just can not fix the stupid.
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u/rollotherottie Sep 10 '24
here comes the unpopular opinion. As a landlord, if you have a nice property and maintain it, why take the risk. Someone with vouchers probably doesn't have any money to go after if they trash your place, plus there is the extra layer of dealing with the gov. If you have a good renter it is a safer bet to rent to someone with a good job/income/credit score. If you your place isn't so nice then its more attractive. I just view it as an increased risk as a landlord.
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u/Skittlesharts Where's the beer? Sep 10 '24 edited Sep 10 '24
If you can refuse to rent to someone with a bad credit score or background or something else, you should be able to refuse this as well. It's your property and you want people living there who are not going to destroy it. Even if you would be fine renting to someone with credit vouchers, you may refuse them based on other criteria. This is a law that keeps the government out of your business.
Edit to add- That and it doesn't violate the Fair Housing Act or anything else like that.
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u/au5lander Transylvania County Sep 10 '24
so the assumption is that because someone is on government assistance (aka ''poor") that they are the type of person that will trash your property?
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u/Maga2024kag Sep 12 '24
Yes. And sadly it’s usually a safe assumption. Look at Covid. We had several friends with rental properties that couldn’t evict because the govt said they had to let people live there RENT FREE, meanwhile they had to keep up the taxes, mortgage etc. The tenants were living off the government. Then, they trashed the houses and our friends were out 10’s of thousands of dollars with no recourse. We no longer have a rental but I would NEVER rent to someone on gov’t assistance.
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u/Skittlesharts Where's the beer? Sep 11 '24
Nope. My point is that you shouldn't be forced to rent to anyone who you don't feel will take care of your property. Doesn't matter if they have housing vouchers or not.
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u/Mister-Marvelous North Asheville Sep 10 '24
Thank You NC GOP for finally sticking up for private property rights and putting it into law with section 7… It was only a matter of time before Asheville and Charlotte tried to pass local ordinances saying you had to take vouchers.
You already could straight up advertise that you didn’t accept vouchers, people don’t understand the pressure a lot of “nonprofits” would put on property managers to accept vouchers. They had already been working with cities on beginning to create local ordinances to force people to accept vouchers.
Do I feel bad for people and are there good people using vouchers? Of course, absolutely… Anyone who has a problem with who in their mind thinks of a single mother with 3 kids or some sweet elderly lady who has a voucher living next to them when in reality this ends up being the person wacked out on meth they see screaming to themselves.
Sorry socialists and Marxists I just want to remind you rent control is also written in law to be illegal in N.C.…
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u/A_murder_of_crochets Sep 10 '24
Your last post was bragging about how you drive drunk. But sure, go off on hypothetical meth grandmas.
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Sep 11 '24
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u/iowhite Sep 10 '24
Please frame this argument from Jesus’ perspective, whom you worship.
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u/Mister-Marvelous North Asheville Sep 11 '24
Tell me more about Jesus and the Bible when people like you can’t do anything except make fun of Jesus….
Let me guess you think Jesus was a socialist?
I have plenty of scripture to combat you….. so you tell me who you worship and the scripture to back it up with….
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u/AuthorizedAgent Sep 10 '24
Being forced to accept voucher would be criminal. It’s near equivalent to being forced to rent to meth heads. Not discriminate against good people using a help system for good. Just identifying the large business risk of the collective.
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u/ExcitementOk1529 Sep 10 '24
There is a difference between being forced to rent to anyone with a voucher and not being allowed to discriminate on the basis of source of income. This absolutely discriminated against people using the system for good by allowing landlord to implement blanket “no voucher” policies.
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u/Mortonsbrand Native Sep 10 '24
What’s the difference between the two. If you’re not allowed to deny based on source of income, you’re defacto forcing them to rent to voucher holders.
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u/ExcitementOk1529 Sep 10 '24
If you have 2 voucher holder and one has good credit and a good rental history and the other doesn’t, you can’t discriminate against the one that meet all of your regular criteria other than “no voucher”.
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u/Mortonsbrand Native Sep 10 '24
Sure.
But say I have 4 applicants.
The two vouchers you mentioned above, the two remaining tenants exactly match the voucher holders save for source of income.
In that case I’d much rather rent to the prospective good tenant who doesn’t have a voucher, and not have to deal with the rigamarole that is associated with voucher programs.
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u/ExcitementOk1529 Sep 10 '24
Well, that is discrimination
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u/Mortonsbrand Native Sep 10 '24
Is it? Where I sit it looks a lot more like a business decision based on the pros/cons of all 4 tenants.
Would you force landlords to take the voucher holder all other things being equal?
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u/rollotherottie Sep 10 '24
you are correct. you look at a lot of things, but if someone with no real income and vouchers with several kids vs a couple with no kids and good income. I know you should give those in more need a hand, but it's a business not a charity at the end of the day. As a landlord you look at who is most likey to pay, be the least hassle, cause less wear and tear on the house, etc
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u/Designer-Anxiety75 Sep 10 '24
Section 8 is really profitable for landlords as you are always guaranteed money from the government. This will only help make sure bad tenants can be dealt with, which will help good tenants find housing. It's a good bill.
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Sep 10 '24
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u/WishFew7622 Sep 10 '24
The I got mine fuck everyone else mindset at its finest.
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u/Turbulent-Today830 Sep 10 '24
Well I would’ve likely lost mine if i were required to rent to those subsidized
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u/WishFew7622 Sep 10 '24
lol you have no way of knowing that. Good luck getting into heaven something about passing a camel through the eye of a needle. I’m sure you’re a good Christian so I shouldn’t need to explain any more.
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u/og_speedfreeq Sep 10 '24
NC GOP once again owning the libs-
They call me "dangerously liberal," but really I just want shit to work.
I want Healthcare that works, Education that works, an electrical grid that works, public transportation that works...
The Republican party really just wants me to work for some corporate overlord, ideally until I die so the government doesn't have to work. It's maddening.