Realtors’ Donation Highlights Disconnect Between SF Residents and Corporate Realtors
San Francisco – The Chicago-based National Association of Realtors pumped nearly $1 million into the campaign to fight Proposition G, a San Francisco ballot initiative that would tax the buying and flipping of apartment buildings, limiting the real estate industry’s ability to use people’s homes as a source of profit.
“Realtors have a financial interest in seeing real estate speculation continue,” said Quintin Mecke, Campaign Manager for San Franciscans Against Real Estate Speculation, the Yes on G Campaign. “But rather than regulate the serial evictors and offer real solutions to our city’s housing affordability crisis, the realtors instead choose to mislead voters and defend the rampant speculation that is causing housing prices to soar. Using people’s homes for profit is not a San Francisco value.”
Proposition G is specifically targeted at serial evictors and would impose a tax on multi-unit properties that are bought and re-sold in less than five years. It would not impose any taxes on single-family homes, condominiums and any owner-occupied homes. No one would pay the tax unless they were buying and flipping multi-unit apartment buildings.
Prior to the donation from the national realtors, the No on G campaign had raised more than $700,000, largely from the California Association of Realtors and the San Francisco Republican County Central Committee. This brings the total amount of contributions from outside San Francisco to the No on G campaign to nearly $1.3 million. The No on G campaign is also backed by local landlords who have invoked the Ellis Act to evict San Francisco tenants, such as Sergio Iantorno and Nova Designs Build, as well as companies that employ Ellis Act evictors.
Click here to view the contribution filing of $800,000 from the National Association of Realtors to fight Proposition G: http://www.speculationfreesf.com/buying_the_vote
