Lindsey Macdonald

Tenant's rights legislation effect on eviction filing in San Francisco (Working Paper)

Abstract: In this paper we explore the effect of San Franscisco’s No Eviction without Representation Act of 2018 on eviction filings. I use a publicly available dataset of 131,232 evictions filed since 1997. This data includes the location of the rental unit, cause of the eviction and filed date. We focus on the time period immediately preceding the act’s passage on 6/5/2018 up to the COVID-19 pandemic’s moratorium on evictions which began 3/13/2020. Using binomial logit and probit regression we compare eviction types as a function of location fixed effects and file date pre or post treatment. We find little support in our stated model that landlords react strongly to pro-tenant legislation or change at fault eviction filing types overall.

​