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PREVIOUSLY

• Eureka Apartment Tenants Say They Were Manipulated Into Big Rent Hikes; Landlord Says They Freely Chose to Help Him Make Ends Meet

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Allen Moore. | Photo by Ryan Burns.

Residents of Eureka’s Hillsdale Apartments are standing up for their legal rights after their new landlord allegedly tried to increase their rents by hundreds of dollars per month, in violation of the California Tenant Protection Act. 

Reached earlier today, 80-year-old Allen Moore said he received a phone call this morning from an attorney with Legal Services of Northern California, a nonprofit organization offering free legal assistance to low-income people and other vulnerable populations in 23 counties. 

“They wrote a letter to the landlord saying it’s illegal to raise my rent by 47 percent,” Moore said.

As the Outpost reported earlier this month, the building’s new owner — a corporation called Dwivedi Tower, LLC, owned by 33-year-old real estate investor Anil Dwivedi — recently notified tenants that all existing month-to-month leases would expire on Feb. 28, with new leases starting March 1 at the following fair market rates:

• Studio: $1,065
• One Bedroom: $1,132

For most if not all residents, including disabled and low-income seniors like Moore, these figures represented massive rent hikes of 40-60 percent or more. The California Tenant Protection Act makes it illegal for landlords to increase rent in any 12-month period by more than 5 percent plus the increased the cost of living (following the Consumer Price Index) or 10 percent total, whichever is lower.

In non-metropolitan areas such as Humboldt County, the 2025 CPI increase is 3.8 percent, meaning local rents can’t legally be increased by more than 8.8 percent in any one-year period.

Rebecca Smith, managing attorney at the Eureka office of Legal Services of Northern California, said she’s unable to provide specific information about any client cases being handled by the organization, but she offered more details about tenants’ rights in California. 

Not only does state law limit the amount that landlords can increase rent each year, but California Civil Code 1947.12 says that even if a lease has been signed, it cannot be enforced if its provisions conflict with the Tenant Protection Act. 

That’s what happened to Moore, who said he signed a new lease agreeing to the massive rent hike only after being personally approached by his new landlord, Dwivedi, who presented him with a stack of papers to sign and implied that failure to do so could result in his eviction. (The original notice taped to tenants’ doors said tenants who don’t agree to the new rent amounts “can choose to vacate the property on or before February 28th, 2025.”)

Moore said he learned this morning that attorneys with Legal Services of Northern California notified Dwivedi that he could be subject to fines for violating state law. 

“This month, Legal Aid is going to suggest that I just pay [my former rent amount of] $720 a month for my rent minus the extra I paid for last month,” Moore said.

Asked what that refund will mean to him, he replied, “Oh my gosh, I’ll be able to buy food and gas.” He previously said that the 47 percent rent hike he’d agreed to under duress would likely make him homeless in a matter of months. 

What will the longer-term restrictions on rent increases mean for him?

“Well, it means that I can survive [and] keep my head above water,” he said. “And as long as I’m not retaliated against … I think I’m doing fine.”

Such retaliation is also against the law, Smith said.

“California Civil Code 1942.5 broadly protects tenants from retaliation in the form of evictions, rent increases or any decreases in services by a landlord [responding to] the tenant’s assertion of rights, included their rights under the Tenant Protection Act,” she said.

Refusing to sign an illegal lease is itself an assertion of tenants’ rights, making it unlawful for a landlord to terminate the lease in response, Smith explained.

Other Hillsdale Apartments tenants have asserted their rights, too. Don Swall, an 84-year-old military veteran who’s been diagnosed with terminal liver cancer, told the Outpost that both he and his downstairs neighbor, 68-year-old Vanessa Vachon, sought help from Legal Services of Northern California. They heard back last week.

“Legal Services called both Vanessa and me and let us know that slumlord had agreed to raise our rent only the state allowed amount of 8.8%,” Swall said in an email to the Outpost last week.

Dwivedi did not immediately respond to a voicemail and email seeking comment for this post. We’ll update readers if we hear back from him.

Legal Services of Northern California will host a “Tenants Rights Presentation” on Jan. 28 from 4-6 p.m. at the Labor Temple in Eureka, located at 840 E Street. Here’s a flyer with that information in both English and Spanish.

Legal Services of Northern California is located at 123 Third Street in Eureka and can be reached via phone at (707) 445-0866.