Forum Post: You could be on a "tenant blacklist", even if you have never missed a payment or damaged property.

"Tenants Together would like to welcome Cy Young winner Tim Lincecum to the tenant blacklist. Here, with nothing more than a landlord’s accusations, a tenant’s ability to find rental housing can be damaged forever.

Last week, Lincecum was sued by his ex-landlord. Headlines blared that Lincecum had allegedly “trashed” his apartment, stolen items from the unit, and caused hundreds of thousands of dollars in damages. The sole source of information was, and is, the landlord’s complaint filed in superior court. No details were submitted with the lawsuit. No photos of the alleged damage were made available. In fact, not a single story contained independent verification of any of the landlord’s claims. But the price tag was widely reported – a whopping $350,000.

Now maybe Tim Lincecum will find a landlord willing to rent to him next season, but it’s likely that regardless of the facts of the case, he will be discriminated against if he tries to rent housing in the future. Even if he wins the case and disproves the allegations, the lawsuit will remain in the files of credit reporting agencies and tenant screening services, not to mention Google searches. He has been, and will forever remain, blacklisted, and there’s not a thing he can do about it.

Lincecum is not alone. Each year, tens of thousands of tenants in California are sued by their landlords, often in eviction actions. In some cases, there are grounds for the lawsuit. In others, there are not. The blacklist does not distinguish between the two types of cases."

http://rentsandrants.blogspot.com/2011/10/tim-lincecum-joins-ranks-of-blacklisted.html