Owning or managing rental housing is Seattle is SO messed up:

It used to be that most rental housing in Seattle was owned and
managed by individual investors. Mom's and Pop's just getting along
with one or a couple units. Figuring they could break even, and after
retiring, they could cash in and show a bit of profit.
Increasingly, because of things shown
in this story, small owners have left (can not take the risk and
potential losses) and big corporations with experts and of a size to
absorb BAD risks are the majority. But what do you see in this story
would encorage you to spend money building rental housing in Seattle?
Government sticking it's nose in IS THE PROBLEM.
OK, they win, so government, and our tax money will get spent poorly
to build housing.
Back in 1969 to 1976 the Federal, State, County, and City of Seattle
proved they were the worst property managers EVER.

This story helps explain:

from
https://www.kuow.org/stories/a-man-dies-of-an-overdose-then-chaos-ensues-at-his-swank-seattle-apartment-building

Bobby Hawran, right, and his sister Bobbie Reagan, left (yes, they share
a first name). Bobby Hawran died after overdosing at his north Seattle
apartment on August 4, 2022.
CREDIT: COURTESY OF BOBBIE REAGAN

A man dies of an overdose. Then chaos ensues at his swank Seattle
apartment building
BY
Isolde Raftery
DEC 21, 2022 at 12:59 PM

Why you can trust KUOW news

I. The two faces of Janus
Bobby Hawran was a retired longshoreman with a handsome face and an even
handsomer pension.

In April 2021, Hawran, 62, moved into an apartment building in north
Seattle. The new building was named Janus, for the Roman god of
beginnings and endings, and the duality between war and peace — a
metaphor for Hawran’s short time in the building if there ever was one.

Hawran lived on the ground floor, with a quiet patio facing an alley. He
was a stone’s throw, almost literally, from the bungalow where he’d
grown up, molded in his father’s image as a man loyal to the waterfront,
although perhaps more loyal to the drink. He was known for being as
generous as he was hardworking, with the chiseled body of Stallone and
the face of Redford — his looks, in particular his blue eyes, were
described by everyone I interviewed about him.

On the day Hawran moved in, staff clocked him as an easy tenant, if a
bit bumbling, who could afford the $2,150 rent for a one-bedroom.

Hawran stopped paying rent that summer. He gave the building manager no
reason other than saying vaguely, “She was supposed to take care of it.”
He didn’t say who “she” was.

There was little management could do. It was the dog days of the
coronavirus pandemic, and an eviction moratorium was firmly in place.

A year and a half after moving in, Hawran lay barely conscious on his
living room floor. Paramedics arrived within minutes of the 911 call and
wheeled him out of the Janus on a stretcher.

Hawran died the next day, Aug. 5, at a Seattle hospital. The cause was
an accidental overdose of fentanyl, methamphetamine, and an opiate that
was likely heroin.

It was the first domino to fall.

II. Greenwood
It’s easy to feel nostalgia for the gritty Seattle of yore, but it was a
less gentle time. Landlords evicted tenants for being a dollar short and
a day late, and cops could haul you off for a baggie of weed.
--( Bull Shit, obviously the author is relying on old false stories,
-- it was never that old west styl

Hawran’s life epitomized old Greenwood, a small, north Seattle
neighborhood, with its fish market, dusty trinket shops, and the Baranof
serving free soup from a pot at the bar.

The waterfront, where Hawran had worked as a longshore worker since he
was 15, was saltier still. Michael Wagner, a friend and coworker of
Hawran’s, described the port as awash in drugs and booze.

“When we started on the waterfront, a lot of the A-men came in with
pints in their back pocket and a 12-pack in their hands, and that was to
get through four hours,” Wagner said. (A-men are the upper tier of
longshore workers.) “It’s not the way it is today, but it’s the way it was.”

By all accounts, Hawran lived a painstakingly disciplined life until his
early 30s.

He practiced karate, lifted weights, and skied. He climbed Mount Rainier
and drove a Corvette, and if someone he knew needed a place to stay, he
invited them in.

“This was part of his problem,” said his sister Bobbie Reagan (yes, they
share a name). “They would stay too long, and then he had to get rid of
them.”

Jack Block Jr., a retired longshore crane operator, said Hawran had a
heart of gold. “He’d give you the shirt off his back,” he said.

As Hawran sank deeper into addiction, he moved in with a woman in a
dilapidated shoebox of a house in Greenwood. Wagner said it wasn’t a
romantic partnership, but he wouldn’t say more.

Court records show the roommate had been charged multiple times with
selling drugs, most recently in 2010, when she was sentenced to 14 days
in jail.

When the woman got cancer, Hawran moved across the street to the Janus
apartments. The Janus is new Greenwood, home to young attorneys and
creatives and their rescue dogs. The building has a brightly lit common
area with a cheery kitchen and a giant TV for game days.

Within weeks of moving, Hawran was joined by a middle-aged woman, her
preschool-aged son, and the child’s father, who residents dubbed “The
Big Man.”

The woman didn’t fit in. She was brusque, loud, and made snide remarks
to tenants who asked her to latch the back gate. Without a key to the
building, she would bawl from the alley, “Bobby! Open the fucking door.”

Who the heck was she?

Everlyn Animas, the no-nonsense building manager, said the woman claimed
to be Hawran’s caretaker.

Animas was skeptical. The woman disappeared for months at a time,
leaving her child and The Big Man with Hawran.

Once, Animas saw Hawran trying to buzz himself into the building.

“Where’s your key fob, Bobby?” she asked.

Hawran told Animas that his guests had it. “I was just supposed to help
them get their own place, but they won’t leave,” he said, according to
Animas.

“That’s not something I can take care of for you,” Animas said she told
Hawran. “If you do want to do something about it, you need to call police.”

The mention of police seemed to make Hawran nervous, she said, and he
hurried past her.

Meanwhile, Nathan McLellan, a resident, noticed unusual behavior around
the building. The first was The Big Man and the child playing with toy
cars in the foyer at 2 a.m. Shouldn’t the child be asleep, McLellan
wondered?

Another time, McLellan walked into the common area and saw a redhead
with a Matt Hasselbeck jersey facing the sink.

“He turns around, and in his hand, I see the orange tip,” McLellan said,
referring to the cap of a hypodermic needle. “I started yelling at him,
like, ‘Get the fuck out of here; what are you doing?’”

McLellan noticed Hawran across the room, sitting quietly.

“As I’m yelling at him, Bobby gets up and leaves,” he said. “He just
slinks out the door, and he’s gone.”

III. Death of a Longshoreman
The day before Hawran was taken out on a stretcher, Aug. 3, he wouldn’t
open the door. According to neighbors who overheard, the woman begged
him for an hour to let her in. “Bobby, please,” she said. “We’ll get
your money.”

Maria Paleologos, who lives in the unit next door, called the scene
“vivid and jarring.”

At 8 p.m. the next evening, the woman called 911 from Hawran’s cell
phone, according to Seattle Fire records. She told a dispatcher that
she’d been out, and that when she returned that evening, Hawran was on
the floor.

“We’re seeing a 62-year-old male who was last seen by his roommate six
hours ago,” a medic radioed. (Hawran had in fact just turned 63.)

Hawran died at Harborview Medical Center the next day, Saturday.

On Sunday, his debit card was used to withdraw the daily maximum. When
his sister closed the account five days later, roughly $12,500 had been
withdrawn. The transactions had taken place at the bank in the Janus
building, and at the Fred Meyer grocery store across the street.

IV. Dominoes fall
caption: A still from a video of a car pulling up to the back of Janus
Apartments in Greenwood, in north Seattle, late summer 2022. In this
video, the driver peels off what appears to be cash from a wad and hands
it to a woman.
A still from a video of a car pulling up to the back of Janus Apartments
in Greenwood, in north Seattle, late summer 2022. In this video, the
driver peels off what appears to be cash from a wad and hands it to a woman.
CREDIT: JANUS RESIDENTS' VIDEO FOOTAGE

Residents said Hawran’s death marked an uptick in activity around the Janus.

After Hawran died, a desk and chair appeared on the sidewalk across the
street, by the Bartell Drugs. Odd, but also harmless. Within three
weeks, it morphed into a homeless camp.

Seattle, like many major West Coast cities, has sidewalks lined with
tents inhabited by people who can’t make rent. Most of these encampments
develop their own discrete ecosystem, but this one seemed to have an
invisible thread leading to the Janus.