Post-fire rent gouging charges have been rare, but LA County violators could soon be fined

Since the January fires that ravaged Los Angeles, thousands of online rental housing listings appear to have raised prices above legal limits. However, the county district attorney has yet to file any criminal charges for rent gouging.

On Tuesday, the L.A. County Board of Supervisors voted in favor of taking a different approach. The board approved crafting a policy that would allow county staff to impose daily fines on landlords and real estate agents who violate price gouging limits.

The motion — put forward by Supervisors Lindsey Horvath and Kathryn Barger — said the new deterrent is needed because a “perceived lack of enforcement can have a negative effect on deterrence and confidence in county government to protect the vulnerable.”

The board voted, 5-0, to instruct county staffers to draft an ordinance within 30 days that would allow the Department of Consumer and Business Affairs to directly fine price gouging violators.

If approved on a second vote, the new policy would enable administrative fines of up to $1,000 a day, without waiting for criminal charges to be filed. Fines of up to $500 a day would be allowed for anyone who failed to comply with an investigation from the department.

Tenant advocates see fines as a useful deterrent

Renters rights organizers who have been tracking price gouging since the fires said they supported the proposal.

“The district attorney is not doing anything,” said Chelsea Kirk, founder of the Rent Brigade, a community group that has tracked 12,800 online listings they believe have violated post-fire price gouging limits.

A spokesperson for District Attorney Nathan Hochman said the office does not comment on pending investigations or potential charges.

“We welcome all tools available to the county to enforce price gouging protections, including strengthening civil actions available to" the Department of Consumer and Business Affairs, the spokesperson said.

Organizers with the Rent Brigade said they’re still spotting close to 400 apparently illegal listings per week, but fewer than a dozen price-gouging cases have been filed by other prosecutors so far.

Kirk said the proposed fines could help send a message that rent gougers will face consequences.

“It will only be a deterrent if [county staff] actually use it,” Kirk said. “If they actually start to impose fines on rent gougers every day, in an aggressive way that is commensurate with the harm they're causing, then yes, I think it could be effective.”

Thousands of complaints, few charges 

The price-gouging rules were first put in place when Gov. Gavin Newsom declared a state of emergency in L.A. County after the fires erupted on Jan. 7. That declaration included a prohibition on price increases of more than 10%, including for rental housing.

Since then, the county has received more than 3,800 price-gouging complaints, according to the motion from Horvath and Barger. Thousands of families who lost homes in the fires were thrown into a highly competitive rental market where some listings nearly doubled their previous asking rents.

Other prosecutors have filed a handful of civil and criminal cases so far, including California Attorney General Rob Bonta and L.A. City Attorney Hydee Feldstein Soto.

Last month, the Board of Supervisors voted to extend the local price-gouging protections, which had been set to expire July 1.

If you spot a suspected price gouging violation, file a complaint with the L.A. County Department of Consumer and Business Affairs at this link.