Renters in Cambridge must be advised by landlords of their rights in case they are evicted, the result of a law passed in 2020. A policy order proposed Monday takes that further, seeking to enact a law saying that tenants must be told when their building is for sale.
It follows a Somerville law taking effect Oct. 14 that requires rental-property owners to tell tenants in writing within 48 hours that they are selling their home.
Cambridge councillors agreed unanimously to send the order to their Ordinance Committee.
“This is building on the language that we already have,” said the motion’s author, Jivan Sobrinho-Wheeler, along with crediting Somerville for leading on the issue locally. “But also note there’s a bill in the state Legislature to enact a tenant opportunity to purchase, which would really be the piece that’s helpful here.”
With enough warning and the purchase price of their building revealed to them, tenants could organize and buy their building from the owner directly under the state bill. It would “give them the first right,” Sobrinho-Wheeler said, or the option “to donate that right to an affordable housing nonprofit.”
A co-sponsor of the Cambridge order, Marc McGovern, emphasized that what the council would discuss was not about right of first refusal, but just about doing the right thing. “Obviously a lot of thought and preparation goes into someone deciding to sell their property,” McGovern said. “Taking the extra step of notifying your tenants a couple days before your property hits the market so that they’re not surprised is really not a heavy burden … so they don’t wake up one day and find a ‘for sale’ sign in front of their house.”
Councillor Patty Nolan called it a commonsense policy that reinforced basic rights and would help reduce displacement, and echoed Sobrinho-Wheeler that enforcement would be important.
“We’ve had this in some of our tenant information, but that hasn’t stopped this kind of thing from happening,” Nolan said, referring to landlords selling without notice. “Hopefully, they would want to [advise tenants] anyway, but we can put in the proverbial stick in addition to a carrot of just wanting all landlords to be want to be good ones.”
