U. collaborative report reveals difficulties NJ renters face

On October 29, Rutgers Law School shared a report from a coalition of tenant advocates urging New Jersey courts to improve their eviction process due to a number of cases where tenant families were not properly represented or landlords failed to provide adequate notice. 

The report read that in 2023, 97 percent of residential tenants did not have a lawyer to defend them from an eviction charge, and lawyers representing tenants frequently came across cases where landlords failed to comply with requirements for eviction filing.

Ashley Maddison, co-author of the report and managing attorney for the Housing Justice Program at Rutgers Law School, said that the research process for the report was standard, but the findings were most surprising.

"There are many legal protections for tenants in New Jersey generally, but legal and procedural protections don't mean anything if they're not enforced," Maddison said. "That's what the issue is here."

She said the report was a collaboration between the Lowenstein Center for the Public Interest and the New Jersey Housing Justice Project, a program including both Rutgers Law School campuses and Seton Hall Law School. Each location works in slightly different areas but works together closely, Maddison said.

She said the court requires evidence to be included in eviction matters, and the court cannot rule over a case if the evidence is insufficient or not present — meaning the case falls outside the court's jurisdiction and therefore contains a deficiency. Thousands of deficient complaints are incorrectly being processed for eviction.

The report reviewed 1,378 complaints, sampling from each county in the state, and found that 69 percent of complaints had at least one legal deficiency and 15 percent had three or more legal deficiencies. Further findings indicated that 11 percent of filed cases received a deficiency complaint from the court where it was appropriate, and out of those with a court-ordered deficiency notice, 23 percent saw the judge pronounce a premature decision or default.

It was also found in the report that the courts failed to give the required five-week notice to tenants before trial in 27 percent of these sample cases.

"We estimate that 29,000 tenant households annually receive judgments of possession or defaults in cases where the court lacks jurisdiction," she said.

Maddison said if courts cease to act outside their jurisdictions, tenants would be tried in accordance with due process with adequate protections, though it does not guarantee that they would not be evicted.

The report called upon the New Jersey Supreme Court to review all residential eviction filings to identify potential deficiencies, amend the complaint form to ensure proper filing procedure and conduct hearings for tenants to present evidence when they miss a deadline, according to an article by Lowenstein Sandler, one of the co-authoring institutions of the report. It also urged courts to strictly enforce the five-week notice requirement when a trial date approaches and regularly monitor and report on results from court review.

In the meantime, if tenants do receive an eviction notice, Maddison recommends seeking immediate legal representation, and if this is not feasible, it is crucial for tenants to learn more about their rights in order to properly uphold them. Nearly half of renters in New Jersey are spending more than one-third of their income on rent costs, and they should not hesitate to seek help or be assertive about housing rights, she said.

"With rising housing costs and the difficulty of finding housing with an eviction record, more and more families will be forced to double up or seek emergency shelter," she said. "It's absolutely devastating."

She said there could be improvements made at the local level if municipalities made information like code enforcement reports or registration statements from landlords more accessible. This information, which is currently guarded by the Open Public Records Act and can only be revealed through a filing process, could help tenants better defend themselves when unable to obtain legal representation.

"Eviction is a traumatic experience with lasting, far-reaching consequences," Maddison said. "The very least we can do as a society is ensure it only happens when there is a firm legal basis to do so."