State lawmakers nationwide are belatedly moving to restore the property rights of owners forced into lengthy and often costly court battles to reclaim their houses from squatters exploiting pandemic emergency tenant protections.
Savvy scammers invoke squatters’ rights by entering unoccupied homes and falsifying residency documents. The process can drag rightful homeowners into monthslong eviction battles while the squatters sell off appliances and turn houses into drug dens. Landlords have lost thousands of dollars in repairs and unpaid rent.
The formula for stealing a house is so foolproof that one illegal immigrant became famous on social media by sharing his step-by-step guide to “invading” vacant homes.
State lawmakers are reclassifying those self-proclaimed “tenants” as intruders and giving homeowners more tools to protect their properties.
“People are afraid … especially our elderly constituents,” said New York state Sen. Jessica Scarcella-Spanton, representing parts of Staten Island and Brooklyn. “We have a lot of constituents who maybe go to Florida for a month or so in the winter; they’re afraid to leave their home behind. Some people have even brought up that they get worried about having a visitor for an extended period of time if it’s not a family member who they really trust.”
New York City had some of the most robust squatters’ rights in the nation until Gov. Kathy Hochul, a Democrat, excluded squatters from tenant protections when she signed the state budget agreement last month.
Before Ms. Hochul cemented the changes, a squatter in New York City needed to stay in a house or apartment for only 30 days before becoming legally recognized as a resident.
The old standards caused multiple conflicts this spring.
A couple of teenagers thought to be squatters were arrested in Pennsylvania and accused in the fatal beating of a Manhattan apartment owner in March. Also that month, a Queens woman was arrested at her late mother’s million-dollar house for trying to change the locks to keep out a group of squatters.
Gun-toting illegal immigrants allegedly had eight people squatting inside a basement unit in the Bronx. Two other suspected squatters tried to use a Shake Shack receipt as proof of residency at a house in Jamaica, Queens.
State lawmakers based in the city proposed a flurry of bills to address the issue. Some sought to redefine “squatter,” and others proposed more proof of residency.
Ms. Scarcella-Spanton is pushing to dissociate the terms “squatter” and “tenant” so the intruders would lose major legal protections.
New York property law now defines squatters as people living in a house without proper documents. It allows local police to get involved in home invasions without forcing property owners to go through the eviction process.
Real estate agents said those changes were urgently needed.
Karen Hatcher, the head of Sovereign Realty & Management in Atlanta, works in the U.S. housing market most affected by squatters.
The National Rental Home Council said the Atlanta area last year had about 1,200 squatting incidents — nearly three times the 475 in the second-ranked area, the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex.
Horror stories abound. An Atlanta real estate agent told local media that a band of squatters sold off the appliances and left “feces everywhere” inside a house that had been “move-in ready.”
A squatter shot an employee of a housing investment firm last spring in the Atlanta suburb of Lithonia, Bloomberg News reported.
Former property manager Tim Arko told multiple media outlets that he lost more than $100,000 when squatters took control of his rental property last year. One of the “tenants” flashed a gun at Mr. Arko during their first interaction. Mr. Arko returned with his rifle and was arrested by police.
Ms. Hatcher called the new Georgia law a “game changer.”
“They are not tenants; they are criminals,” Ms. Hatcher told The Times. “We have to have a clear delineation within our law that specifies that you can’t just break into a property and be automatically considered a tenant.”
The new law treats squatters as trespassers rather than as tenants. The accused squatter would have three days to provide proof of residency or risk criminal charges.
The Georgia House and Senate passed the bill unanimously. The law took effect late last month with the signature of Gov. Brian Kemp, a Republican.
Florida has been the most proactive in fighting squatters.
Gov. Ron DeSantis, a Republican, signed a bill similar to Georgia’s in March. The law allows the local sheriff’s office to escort accused squatters and their belongings off the property. Those who refuse can be arrested on trespassing charges.
Rose Kemp, president of the Orlando Regional Realtor Association, welcomed the law. Orlando ranks third among the areas hardest hit with squatters, trade groups say.
Ms. Kemp said she and other real estate agents she knows have had trouble with intruders.
In 2021, one of her clients rented out a home to a retiring military veteran from out of state.
When the tenant arrived in Florida two weeks after signing the lease, the home’s lockbox was missing. Ms. Kemp said the tenant peeked into the house and saw trash and food strewed about.
A family of squatters with children had moved into the property, Ms. Kemp said. Police noticed a broken window in the back of the property and arrested the adults on trespassing charges.
What Ms. Kemp said was most alarming wasn’t the brazen intrusion but discovering a checklist of nearby homes.
“These were professional squatters with multiple addresses that they have found in the area. All of these different addresses with little notes, checkmarks,” Ms. Kemp told The Times. “They had been basically vetting to see where to go.”
Property ownership took a hit during the economic slowdown early in the COVID-19 pandemic when many jurisdictions imposed moratoriums on evictions to forestall a wave of homelessness. Some cities and states extended and reextended those programs. Along the way, scammers learned how to exploit laws to live rent-free.
The root of the problem dates to the mass of foreclosures after the housing bubble burst in 2008, said Mark Miller of the Pacific Legal Foundation.
The senior attorney said a dearth of newly built homes, thanks partly to regulations that limit home construction, is driving up costs and pricing people out of the housing market.
It has created the kinds of squatters Ms. Hatcher has encountered: working people who, for financial reasons or because of a criminal record, wouldn’t qualify for a lease.
Mr. Miller said a stable society is built on property rights enforcement.
“If our governments are not going to protect property, then we have to elect people who will because otherwise, people start to lose respect for the law — and that’s bad for everybody,” he said.
• Matt Delaney can be reached at mdelaney@washingtontimes.com.
Please read our comment policy before commenting.