Apartment City

A loophole that allows landlords in Washington, D.C., to get around the city’s rent-control policy is going to court. A legal case between a local, named Matthew Pfaff , and Woodley Park’s South Cathedral Mansions apartment building will be one of the first in local civil court to directly address the issue of rent concessions, according to Washington City Paper , who further reported: “The practice goes like this: A landlord of a rent- controlled building offers an applicant a discount on monthly rent as an incentive for that person to move in. That landlord registers a higher rent amount with the city, even though the tenant usually has no idea there’s a second value in play. (Or if they do, they don’t know what it means.) When the lease comes up for renewal, the landlord raises the rent based on that higher number ... The tenant must decide whether to move out or try and negotiate down.” Generally, the maximum standard annual rent increase is 0.3 percent for tenants living in a...

Darrow Montgomery When  Matthew Pfaff was looking for a rent- controlled apartment in D.C. last year, he thought he could find one within his budget and in a convenient location—without much ado. But more than a year and a half later, Pfaff is reflecting on how much of a headache that process became. After applying for a one-bedroom unit at the historic South Cathedral Mansions apartment building in Woodley Park, property management staff repeatedly delayed his move-in date and made conflicting statements about what his rent would be, according to a lawsuit Pfaff ’s attorney Aaron Arce Stark filed in D.C. Superior Court this summer. The Silver Spring resident is suing for damages he allegedly suffered because he had to go month-to-month on his existing lease at a higher rate, hired movers, and sold some furniture. “I didn’t want to move every year to stay in an affordable unit,” says Pfaff, who remains in the same apartment he was living in when he applied. “I’m not entirely sure...

On the morning that Alfonso Maldonado Silva was set to argue his first case before the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in Pasadena, Ca., he was too nervous to even drink a glass of juice for breakfast. So he decided to head to court early to review the case one last time. He said a short prayer asking for wisdom, then he showered, dressed in a neatly pressed gray suit , and on an overcast morning last April, headed out the door with his evidence binder in hand. He had been up since 5 a.m. Maldonado, a third- year law student at Western State College of Law in Orange County, had left nothing to chance. This would be his first time arguing a case in court before any judge. So he had arrived the night before to stay in a Pasadena hotel to avoid the clogged commute from his Corona apartment during rush-hour. The only thing on the 28-year-old’s mind was the law. Much was riding on this case. Maldonado and his fellow law student , Cristel Martinez Medina , were representing an undocumente...

BARCELONA, Spain — The Latest on the Spain attacks (all times local): 5:15 a.m. Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has asked people to pray for a young Australian boy who is missing after a vehicle attack on a popular Barcelona promenade that killed 13 people. Turnbull said Saturday that the boy's mother was badly injured and is in a hospital following Friday's attack at the Las Ramblas promenade . Turnbull says the boy's family is searching for him. He did not release the boy's name. Turnbull says: "All of us as parents know the anguish his father is going through, and his whole family is going through, as they rush to seek to find him in Barcelona." Australian Foreign Minister Julie Bishop says four Australians were injured in the attack. ___ 2:35 a.m. Police in Catalonia say they have searched two buses in their hunt for violent extremists believed responsible for a pair of deadly attacks in the northwestern region of Spain. Police say on the...