Family with disabled 10-year-old daughter faces eviction after COVID hardships

A Riverside family with a severely disabled 10-year-old daughter said they have been given just days to move out of their home after being evicted for falling behind on rent due to COVID-related job loss.

"There is the right way to do things and there is a wrong way, and evicting somebody out of their home, behind their back, is not okay," said Shannon Arellano, who helped her daughter, April, focus on homework as a distraction from the looming threat of eviction.

Last week, the eviction notice was posted on the door of the family's Riverside home. It said the Arellanos had just one week to pack up and move.

The family is about $40,000 behind on rent. Antonio Arellano, who works as a flooring contractor, said his business hasn't recovered from the COVID-related shutdown.

"It's just hard because we have already gone through so much," she said.

Shannon stays home with her daughter, 10-year-old April, who contracted sepsis as a toddler and had to have her right leg, below the knee, amputated. She worries that the eviction situation will be very scary for a child her daughter's age to understand.

Shannon said she and her husband were caught off guard by the eviction notice because she and her husband were expecting to go to court to plead their case, but when they showed up to court last week, she said they were told their case was called the day prior and they'd lost.

"And I showed her my paperwork, it says March 10th. That's today at 1 o'clock. I don't understand how we lost a case that we weren't here to defend ourselves for," she said.

The Arellanos said they tried for months to set up a payment plan, but their landlord, Invitation Homes, was unresponsive.

"I have called them at least two to three times every month, trying to figure out what's going on," Shannon said.

After CBSLA reached out to Invitation Homes, the Arellanos said a company representative called them the next day saying Invitation Homes would consider a payment plan. The problem, according to the Arellanos, is that the company wants all their missed rent paid back in a year, which would add another $3,000 to their monthly rent.

"So, you're talking about $6,000-$7,000 in rent," Shannon said.

Invitation Homes is one of the largest landlords in America. It saw record profits in both 2020 and 2021, almost $2 billion in revenue last year alone.

Francisco Duenas is a tenants rights activist. He said that what's happening to the Arellanos is happening across California as eviction moratoriums expire.

"A lot of times an eviction is a major stumbling block in people's lives," Duenas said, and added that some families without relatives or friends to take them in while they rebuild end up homeless.

For residents in need, the City of Riverside has an emergency rental assistance program. In Los Angeles County, information on tenant protections and resources can be found by following this link, and the organization Stay Housed L.A. is a useful resource for renter's rights and state rental assistance programs.