The College Park City Council on Feb. 3 unanimously approved an ordinance that will prevent landlords from asking tenants to renew a lease sooner than 180 days from the end of the current lease.
The so-called early lease ordinance, overwhelmingly supported by students renting apartments in high-rise buildings on or near Route 1, was introduced in September. The issue drew comments from more than 20 tenants who attended a November public hearing.
Students lined up again on Feb. 3 to share stories about landlords who approached them as soon as a month after move-in, threatening to substantially raise the rent or replace the occupants with other tenants unless they renewed their leases as far in advance as 10 months before their year-long contracts were set to expire.
Sami Saeed, a public policy major at the University of Maryland (UMD), said his former landlord contacted him four weeks after he moved in with a report of offers of “thousands of dollars per month” more than Saeed was paying in rent, “and that I had to decide by the end of the week or someone else was going to take our house.”
Saeed added: “The stress that that caused me … trying to find anyone to live with for next year. I had to call 50 people. … That is the situation renters are faced with. That is the situation I was faced with. It happened to me.”
The council vote was for an amended ordinance that changed the timeframe when landlords are allowed to offer lease renewals from the original proposal’s suggested 180 days after the start of the lease to 180 days before it ends. The amendment had been offered in December by Councilmember Holly Simmons, who pointed out that for leases longer than 12 months, counting from the end instead of the beginning ensures that tenants do not have to make decisions for the following year far in advance of the expiration of their leases.
The ordinance promises to fine landlords $500 the first time they violate the new law and $2,500 for subsequence offenses.
Two landlords spoke against the ordinance at the Feb. 3 meeting.
College Park resident David Dorsch, who said he has been in the rental business for half a century, said the law is unnecessary, as landlords and tenants understand when they sign a lease what the terms are.
He called the ordinance “B.S. … I don’t see ay way that this helps anything other than it causes a lot more paperwork.”
Landlord Richard Biffl warned the council that because the city held a public hearing on the proposal in November before three councilmembers were replaced in December, it must hold a second public hearing before voting.
Mayor Fazlul Kabir responded that the city charter allows for one council to adopt a measure proposed and put up for a public hearing by an earlier council.
Nick DiSpirito, UMD’s student liaison to the city council, also had a message for landlords: “This ordinance has been adopted,” he said near the end of the meeting. “If you are going to continue to do predatory practices as a landlord, we will hold you accountable, full stop.”