Rent Evictions Are Banned For Two Months Under New Executive Order

On Friday, Governor Gavin Newsom announced a new executive order that would ban evictions of renters affected by the COVID-19 coronavirus until the end of May.

Executive Order N-37-20 will require that tenants would have to declare that they can’t pay the rent due to the coronavirus no more than one week after the rent is due. Landlords would need to be informed, but the declaration would not need to go to them in advance for April and May rents. All outstanding rent would need to be paid to the landlord following the moratorium “in a timely manner”.

“California now has a statewide moratorium on residential evictions for those impacted by COVID-19,” said Governor Newsom in a tweet on Friday. “This will be in place until at least the end of May. No one should lose their home because of COVID-19.”

NEW: CA now has a statewide moratorium on residential evictions for those impacted by #COVID19. This will be in place until at least the end of May.

No one should lose their home because of COVID-19.

LEARN MORE: https://t.co/xtXFwVeWc2

— Gavin Newsom (@GavinNewsom) March 27, 2020

The new executive order comes only ten days after Newsom’s older order allowing for counties and cities to halt evictions and less than 48 hours after a 90 day moratorium on most mortgage payments in the state was announced.

“This is good, but come June, there are going to be a lot of problems,” noted Redding banker Danielle Robertson. “The ‘in a timely manner’ paying back is very open to interpretation, and that’s for paying two months of rent. For families that’s thousands of dollars. And if landlords want that money ASAP, that means renters may only have a few weeks to pool it together. And we may not even be back to full strength by then, not to mention some of these jobs being permanently lost.”

“This may help some, but for some renters it”s just a delay more than anything. And they may have done this to buy time to figure something else out.”

“Rent isn’t like a mortgage that can be passed down a few months and made up. Rent builds up for a payment. And it will cause problems.”

This sentiment was echoed in tweets responding to Governor Newsom’s tweet.

People ARE going to lose their homes, sir, just later as opposed to now.

They have zero income and will have to pay thousands of dollars owed overnight.

— RENT FORGIVENESS NOW! (@WhatWillItTakex) March 27, 2020

Will renters lose their housing afterwards when they have to pay back the large debt? Is their credit safe?

— Kathleen???? (@kathmandu4) March 27, 2020

Newsom’s eviction moratorium executive order went into effect immediately on Friday and, without an extension, will last through May 31, 2020.