Dear Friends,

Like many people in San Francisco, we are fighting to save our home. Yvette has been in this apartment for 18 years and is blessed with SF Rent Control. We have been enduring months of harassment from our upstairs neighbor and now our landlord is involved. The upstairs neighbor highlights include violence/broken windows, stealing from us, and even creepily watching us sleep. The landlord has stated that they want us out of our apartment and will do nothing to help us. The courts are now involved.

Our circumstances have escalated to the point where we need to hire a lawyer, desperately. After a long search we luckily found an experienced attorney, through the SF Bar Association, who believes our case is strong and most importantly, winnable. We met with her a few days ago and we left with a sense of calm we haven't had in months. Because we are low income we received a significant discounted fee...but because we are low income, even with the discount, we can't cover the retainer fees. We simply just do not have the funds.

We need your help.

Both of us are full-time students (Yvette for Nursing and Erin for Biology/Histology). On top of the housing stress Erin was in a car accident and sustained a concussion / traumatic brain injury. She has been off work since the accident a few weeks ago and her return to work date is unknown, dependent upon her recovery. Any emergency money we had stashed away has been used to pay bills while Erin has been off work.

This has all been extremely stressful, a perfect storm if you will, and though it is quite humbling to be forced to ask for help it’s time to appeal to you, our Community, for help ... we really need you right now.

If we don't get an attorney in time to get up to speed by our next court date (August 3rd) we face:

~ losing our rent-controlled housing
(with three dogs and limited income this is terrifying),

~ losing our affordable schooling
(Erin's Histology Program is the only one of its kind in all Northern California and the only Public School on the West Coast to offer this Certification...Yvette is going to SF City College and has just shy of two years left, one of the only free Nursing Programs in the country),

~ and losing our futures in the Bay Area/beyond. 


Anything you donate to help us would be deeply appreciated. Every little bit helps, it's true! Please contact us directly if you have any ideas of other ways to help. If you can't help, would you please consider passing this appeal along to someone you think would be down for our cause, with a good word, it would really mean a lot to us. If you have any questions, please reach out. 

Thank you for taking the time to read our story and thank you in advance for your support, we and our three fur-babies are humbled by the spirit of our Community. 

Much love and light to you and your family from ours.
 
Love,
~ Yvette & Erin


P.S.

The fur babies :)