Hoboken's Rent Control Issues - Question On Ballot

Hoboken's Rent Control ordinance has sparked controversy for the last few years following exorbitant law suits from tenants seeking compensation. And most recently an amendment set a cap on damages paid to tenants that sue their landlords for their rents not being appropriately registered with the city. Thankfully, after last year's voting mess, this election season,  rent control will make it's way on the ballot.

You may remember last year people walking around town wearing billboards saying Vote Yes or Vote No to the proposition sparking criticism from tenant's rights groups that said their people misinterpreted the question as it's wording was confusing thereby asking voters to vote 'against tenant's rights' when their intention was for the opposite effect.

Well, the question is undergoing scrutiny once again, as the city and Mayor Zimmer claim that the wording, is confusing. And confusing it is!!

In a statement release on www.hobokennj.org 's website, Mayor Zimmer says that in order to protect voter's rights they need to be able to understand the question. In it's current form it reads as follows:

Shall the City of Hoboken continue annual rental increase protections for current residents of rent controlled properties but allow property owners to negotiate rents for vacant apartments and exempt buildings with one-to-four units and condominium units from the rent leveling ordinance by adopting the proposed amendment to Chapter 155 of the Code of the City of Hoboken?

If you don't know much about the current rent control ordinance, or perhaps what Chapter 155 is, or have a hard time with a question posed like this, needless to say, this would be difficult to interpret. It would require concentration, and reading the question over several times.. like it did for me - and I know what the rent control ordinance is about!

Now the statement below, is how the Clerk is proposing the question be phrased:

Shall Hoboken’s Rent Control law be amended to provide that upon vacancy, buildings containing 4 or fewer units that are now covered by rent control become exempt from the City’s Rent Control laws, and that buildings containing more than 4 units that are now covered by Rent Control, upon vacancy, be permitted to charge the new tenant a market rate rent, while continuing to be covered by the other provisions of the City’s Rent Control laws such as the limitations on annual rent increases and other tenant protections?

This ordinance has caused many home owners losses in potential rental income as well as difficulty selling. It's come as bad timing, because with the real estate market depreciation it forced would be seller's to rent their condos, but it also left them unable to reap the benefits of a strong rental market with high demand and high rents. You see, many apartments that have been converted to condo's over the years, have never had their 'rents "registered" with the city, so the town has outdated records dating as far back in some cases as 20 years ago!
   
 Lori Turoff of Hoboken Real Estate news made a few interesting points on her post last March

Personally as a home owner, I feel that an individual condo owner should be able to set a rent amount of their choosing, if it's high or low that should be their decision. Rents are dictated by the market, when things are slow prices come down and landlords pay broker fees, when they're hot, the opposite happens. If the rent is too high no one will their apartment just like if a home is priced to high - no one will buy it.

This ordinance should really be applicable to the Applied Housings of Hoboken, the Archstones and those larger rental buildings who change their rent prices almost weekly increasing sometimes more than 5%

We're already seeing, this hurts real estate values by turning away potential investors, and it also hurts home owner's pockets if they aren't able to collect rent that comes close to or cover's their monthly carrying costs, which when you include property taxes and maintenance fees add up very quickly.


Whatever your feeling on this, you may own a condo of your own one day, do you want an outdated ordinance dictating your market rent? Or should that be up to the market and the tenants themselves?


What are your thoughts? What do you think about Hoboken's rent control ordinance, will you come out to vote this election?