Residents of 1120 Jackson Street gathered on the front porch of their building on Monday, protesting eviction notices that six out of the building’s 16 units have received.
Many of the residents were elderly Chinese tenants. Among them was Kin Wong.
Wong says he and his wife have lived in the building for more than 35 years. Like them, most of their neighbors are seniors, and over the decades, they have looked after one another and watched their children grow up together.
But after the building was sold to a new owner, Wong says management told his mother-in-law there was too much clutter in her unit and that if it was not cleared out within 10 days, she could face eviction.
A similar thing happened to Kit Ying Mak’s mother. Mak’s family has lived in the building since 2001, after immigrating to San Francisco from Hong Kong. Mak says after the building changed hands last October, inspectors began showing up at their apartment without explaining why.
“They just came in and take pictures and then go without saying anything to us, no communication, no information,” Mak said.
At the same time, Mak says her mother's rent jumped from $628 a month to $2,820 starting in December of last year — a 350% increase. Before that, she says rent had been going up by about 2% annually.
But even after paying the higher rent, Mak says her mother was also told there was too much clutter in the unit and that if it wasn’t cleaned up, she could face eviction.
Laura Chiera, executive director of Legal Assistance for the Elderly in San Francisco, says landlords can legally evict tenants for excessive clutter inside a unit, but the legal threshold is high.
“The Department of Building Inspections and the Fire Department have a very clear standard of what that means,” Chiera said. “So just saying, ‘I walk into your apartment and I think you have too many bags,’ is not enough.”
She says if landlords have safety concerns, the first step should be working with tenants, not threatening eviction.
Gen Fujioka of the Chinatown Community Development Center says cases like these may point to a broader pattern. He helped compile a citywide report showing eviction notices in San Francisco have increased by more than 140 percent since 2024.
“The number of tenants who are behaving badly has more than doubled. It’s nonsensical, right?” Fujioka said.
Fujioka says eviction trends like these hit elderly and low-income tenants the hardest.
For the residents of 1120 Jackson Street, the fight to stay in their homes is just beginning.
