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Landlords are targeting vulnerable tenants to solicit sex for rent

Gwen Aviles Gwen Aviles is a trending news and culture reporter for NBC News.

6-7 minutes

Some landlords are taking advantage of the coronavirus outbreak, soliciting sexual favors in lieu of rent payments from economically vulnerable tenants, according to advocates.

Khara Jabola-Carolus, executive director of the Hawaii State Commission on the Status of Women, said her office has received more reports of landlords sexually harassing their tenants in the last two weeks than it had in the two years since she started working there, including cases of landlords offering to move in with tenants and sending sexually explicit photos to them after they communicated concerns about paying April rent.

While the number of cases wasn't necessarily astronomical — the commission received 10 reports about nine landlords — Jabola-Carolus said they were especially notable given such cases go "vastly underreported."

"Landlord coercion has always been a reality, but we've never seen anything like this," Jabola-Carolus said. "The coronavirus creates the perfect conditions for landlords who want to do this because not only are people being instructed to stay home, but the virus has added to the economic stress with people losing their jobs, especially in Hawaii, which is driven by tourism."

Around 5 million more people filed first-time unemployment claims last week, bringing the total of unemployed Americans to nearly 22 million. While some states have enacted eviction and rent moratoriums, experts caution that these policies may not be enough to keep low- and middle- income renters in their homes. Only 69 percent of apartment tenants had paid their monthly rent by April 5, down from 81 percent the previous month, according to the National Multifamily Housing Council.

Advocates like Renee Williams, a senior staff attorney at the National Housing Law Project, suspect that as tenants continue to struggle economically, there will be heightened reports of sexual harassment enacted by landlords in the upcoming months.

"Landlords have all the leverage in the landlord-tenant relationship and in these types of situations, they especially prey on women who are vulnerable, who are housing insecure, have bad credit or who don't have anywhere to go," Williams said. "We've already seen that the pandemic is exacerbating a lot of systemic issues and sexual harassment targeted at tenants by landlords is likely to be one of these issues."

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Tenants have recourse

As the coronavirus pandemic continues to uproot daily life, there may be added confusion about where tenants who may be experiencing such harassment can go with their claims, but advocates say tenants have recourse.

"Under the federal Fair Housing Act, sexual harassment by landlords is illegal," Sandra Park, senior staff attorney at the American Civil Liberty Union's Women's Rights Project, said. "Many states also have laws that ban sexual harassment and discrimination."

She added that tenants experiencing harassment should file a report with the police to "leave a paper trail," but given that doing so does not always guarantee an investigation, she also suggested that tenants should seek the help of local legal and social services, including human rights commissions.

"Many courts are closed right now, but getting involved with these organizations and having a lawyer from them call landlords could put landlords on notice that their behavior is unacceptable," Park said.

Yet Park and other advocates acknowledge that women who are most vulnerable — particularly women of color and immigrant and undocumented women — will not feel comfortable submitting a report or pursuing action against their landlords and that many times when they do so, they are often dismissed.

"I am do not think most of the women who submitted reports will go on to pursue action because they are so vulnerable," Jabola-Carolus said.

This is why she created a guide for those whose landlords may be pressuring them for a sexual arrangement.

"We want landlords to know we're watching them and that women who are dealing with this are not alone," Jabola-Carolus said. "It's really women who are holding every community right now. We're the majority of health care, elder care and child care workers and coronavirus is highlighting the silence of oppression of women in the U.S. I could not even envision a more gendered crisis."

Stay-at-home orders can exacerbate harassment

Compared to sexual harassment in the workplace, sexual harassment in housing has received much less attention, according to Park, whose first case with the ACLU was on behalf of an Alabama woman whose real estate manager tried to repeatedly coerce her into having sex with him and attempted to raise her rent when she refused. Though limited, the research on sexual harassment in housing suggests how prevalent the issue extends. According to a 2018 pilot study conducted by Rigel Oliveri of the University of Missouri's School of Law, 10 percent of low-income women in Columbia, Missouri, had experienced significant sexual harassment by landlords.

While there are federal and state laws prohibiting sexual harassment in housing, many advocates call upon housing providers and public housing authorities that do not yet have these policies to institute them.

Isa Woldeguiorguis, executive director of the Center for Hope and Healing, also urges people to not discount the power of checking in on neighbors during this time, as staying at home not only can exacerbate sexual harassment, but other forms of violence and abuse.

"Reach out in whatever ways you can. We may not physically be able to be there, but we can call or walk by their homes," Woldeguiorguis said. "Survivors need us not to forget."

No big surprise there are an awful lot of low life landlords I have run into in my lifetime. A lot of people today have no morals . This has been going on for a long time. It’s the low life landlords with the lowlife tenants.

"A coin has two sides" - could be false claims after LLs rejected offers of sex for rent.

When screening one applicant, she asked if my husband would be picking up the rent. I never mentioned a husband. She was the one with a stripper pole mounted in the living room. She had made an odd comment about my living room floor being ‘over wood’, and that hers was over concrete. Must have made mounting that pole a little more difficult.

Glad I do those in-home application pick-ups. Next!

Mike TX that's BS. Who the heck you hanging out with?????? You've run into many????

Please other LL's jump in here lets not allow these kinds of statements to be made about us. ITS not true.99.9% offer good housing and most I know have no contact with tenants. This is a blanket statement read from some book or heard on MSNBC.

OK so maybe you meet one or two--- I've been doing this since 86 and driven many a street--- I just don't see it and certainly not met any.

"Landlords have all the leverage in the landlord-tenant relationship" is hardly true in Hawaii. Laws in Hawaii are extremely pro-tenant.

At any rate, I'm sure a few of those reports are true and a few of those reports are false accusations.

I do not allow my son or my workmen to go into tenant houses without me there as a chaperone. Not because my people will misbehave, but to protect them against false accusations.

From the other angle, I often see ads on Craigslist with male and female hopeful tenants offering sex in exchange for rent... and food stamps in exchange for rent.

Anybody who thinks women aren’t approached regularly with unwanted male attention has never been a woman.

Growing up, i had a couple of good friends who revealed they were molested by their fathers. Every one of those fathers had said odd things to me. Things about the fit of my clothes, style of my hair. I was fairly modest, they would comment that I should dress more appealing. Who says that to a sixteen year old friend of their daughter? I know, perverts!

Within mine and my husband’s families, there have been a couple of family ‘friends’ and relatives that have gone to jail for assault or child porn. All of those individuals gave off that same creepy feeling.

So, yes, I think there are landlords who will take advantage of a situation, just as these men took advantage of their children, or the neighbor’s kid. To pretend otherwise is foolish. I also firmly believe there are plenty of tenants who will try to offer ‘services.’

It’s something to be AWARE of, and take steps to NOT be caught in a situation can be misunderstood. During the early part of a tenancy, I only do work on the property when the tenant is home, I keep the conversations brief, and to the subject of the repair. As we get to know each other, I become more comfortable with the adults, more so with the women ( I’m a woman,) but I always maintain distance from the kids. I may chat with them , but ONLY with parent present.

Gee Busy, some of us "creepy" guys just need a hug once in a while. And always remember, often our wives don't understand us!

I find this hard to believe.

Perhaps I’ve just seen enough, Don.

Most, men, by far, MOST men are fine. But, there are those few.....

Same can be said about women, btw.

Or, any group. A few bad apples...

WL, (CA) Do you actually believe what you type? I don’t think there is a federal task force looking for a landlord that wants to date a tenant.

New accuser emerges in sex discrimination litigation ...

San Diego Union Tribune

SAN DIEGO — A landlord already facing allegations of engaging in a longstanding pattern of sexual harassment against female tenants will have to face one more accuser in court. A former tenant of...

A Spring Valley landlord was recently accused of subjecting numerous women to unwanted sexual advances, according to a new federal lawsuit. The issue of sexual harassment in housing has gained ...

He’s being sued . He did not get arrested. And it doesn’t say anything about a federal task force arresting people for sexual harassment.

Yes, google is your friend..l.. read and weep! From Google

Sexual Harassment comes in two distinct forms:

Quid Pro Quo: A person in authority demands or requires sexual acts in exchange for preferential treatment, or to avoid punitive actions.

Hostile Work Environment: A person in authority/employer fails to remedy a work environment where sexually inappropriate behavior, comments, or other actions are occurring, making the workplace intimidating or offensive.

U.S. launches crackdown on sexual harassment in housing

"The two departments (DOJ and HUD) will create a task force to combat sexual harassment in housing and pursue a public awareness campaign to convince victims to report abuses with the backing of the government. This comes as the #MeToo global movement to stop sexual harassment continues to gain momentum . . . “We are not seeing vigorous fair housing enforcement out of the Department of Justice in the last year,” said Joe Rich, co-director of the Fair Housing and Community Development Projects at the advocacy group Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law.

Translation: open season on Metooing LLs. CYA!

Once again, sexual harassment is NOT a crime and you CANNOT BE ARRESTED AND CHARGED for it. And according to your own post this task force your talking about is not looking for LL’s as you suggested. According to your post they are only trying to convince women to report sexual ABUSE...

Just thought I would add

Mike TX thanks for those constructive comments. I was reading your statement and see it as a blanket-- when you say you've SEEN MANY?

Awful lot and seen many comes along with low life no morals comes under blanket statements.

You just don't like being called out on a ridiculous posting. Where the other "stuff" came from-- gee who knows?

Yea I've been doing this a while as have many others here and reviewed many posts didn't see much in the way of LL's posts here about sex favors either.

Sorry you don't like my posts but I can't help myself-- when I see BS statements about LL's I just can't let that go. This site is actually trying to clean up that image don't you think?

LOTF TX,

Fred and NE.

If you add the middleman-- its a m'enage a trois!!!!

Mike TX--- man no problem. No apology necessary-- none. I'm a big boy and I give it out (and as you mentoned) you do too. (and are pretty good at it I must say).

Myob, I'm an investor. I want the most bang for my buck.

Well maybe, that's too far??

Musta been a slow news day. This has been going on since the beginning of time. Nothing new.

And yes, I have met scuzzy LLs locally who would do such things.

BRAD

This does present a legal problem...

Consenual with "value" makes it prostitution and visiting a prostitute.

But what about eviction court?

"Your honor, I did ____ and ____ and ____ so my rent is paid up."