Tosh Show - My Eviction Attorney - Niv Davidovich

Episode Date: January 27, 2026

Daniel holds court with Niv Davidovich, a Los Angeles attorney who has seen it all while helping landlords evict nightmare tenants. Join our Patreon for exclusive content: http://patreon.com/toshshow

Can I legally smoke meth in my apartment? No. Asking for a friend. Welcome to Tosh Show. I'm Daniel. That's Eddie. What's up, Daniel? I'll tell you what's up.

Mm-hmm. Just got back from leg one of the tour. Oh, yeah. My first farewell tour, 2026, brought the in-laws with us. Pacific Northwest. Rainy, beautiful. snowy oh here's my gripe okay i bring my in-laws i want to show them the world yet all day long they're just on their phone yeah yeah the father-in-law playing solitaire mother-in-law some

version of a slot machine candy crush hybrid and if you told me that they're screaming time was seven or eight hours a day on their phone, I would be like, well, that seems low. It's just, I don't get it. And you, I take photos of them on their phone now, just so I can document it. It's like here, you're in the most beautiful city in Whistler, British Columbia, Canada. You know, we're in this magnificent suite in the four seasons. and they're just both head down in the phone. Just all day.

A couple screenagers. And they just can't wait to chime in with whatever latest, you know, tidbit they've learned. Did you pick that up on BuzzFeed? I think they, who would have guessed that these baby boomers would be the ones that are on their phone, addicted to their phones way more than the Alvas, the Gen Z? The problem is the boomers on the phone. Oh, it's maddening to watch. I'm just like, why do I take you anywhere?

Just, we should, I'm telling my wife, I think we should just put them in a home. Put them in a home with unlimited data and, you know, nice high-speed internet and they're fine. Just always on their phone. They fall asleep sitting up. It's like looking at their phones. It's just depressing.

That's not how you want to live. And if somebody points it out to you, you should probably say, oh, I am doing that. Oh, it does say my screen time is a disgusting amount. Maybe I'm addicted. I should get help. I don't know. By the way, Whistler, that was my first time there. Just beautiful.

What a wonderful place. Now you say, well, why don't you make that your home away from home and not Tahoe? Well, it's too far. you have to clear customs and then it's it's a long drive from the nearest airport or you jump on a puddle jumper it's not my no that's not going to work but it is beautiful the mountains my my son and i my wife we rode blackcomb had a great day yeah i liked it they got they got a good thing up there they know what they're doing a lot of foreigners vacationing there i'm self-conscious being american now people look at you people know you know thankfully i'm a california elitist so they still roll the red carpet out for me right

then as soon as they got back my wife's birthday i up we go heading up the coast to where my brother lives up in monocito and just could just kept seeing celebrities who'd you see i'll tell you who we saw conno brian eating lunch okay carroll burnett eating dinner what and then uh the big one The big celebrity sighting. Drew from Property Brothers. Yeah, those are the big three. That's your second Carol Benettes. I've seen Carol twice now.

Here's, I mean, the thing is, I eat at the same time Carol eats. Yeah. We're five o'clock diners. It's perfect. Then we watch some football. You know, the way my wife likes to celebrate her birthday. You see, it's perfect, perfect for her. It's her day.

No, I don't get to watch it when it's on. I have to wait to watch it. she falls asleep at night and then I get to uh then I get to watch and catch up that is your move but it's gotten so good with slinging your phone to the hotel TV that you know it's it's perfect and I don't I'm not glued to my phone all day like my in-laws so I can I can easily go dark and I don't know who who's winning speaking of celebrities you know we got another Malibu neighbor who's coming oh former vice president President Kamala Harris moved to Malibu.

This is great. That's great. Welcome. I don't know if she knows how many backwoods Trumpers live around here. Oh, it's disgusting. No, that's great. I hope to see her out and about,

and I'm going to invite her and her husband to play pickleball with me. Nice of you. I'd like to have her on the show, but I, as just a fun neighbor, but I also want to invite her to play pickleball or some Majan with me. I don't know that she knows how to play. I'm not very good. You learn together. So Kamu's in the neighborhood.

That's great that she can afford to live in Malibu. You know? Somebody that just gave her life working for the people. Public servant. A public servant is now living in Malibu. Good for her. I hope she stays here for a long time. But if today's guest comes knocking on her door, I hope she doesn't answer.

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Italian leather outerwear that keep you warm when it's actually cold. refresh your winter wardrobe with quince go to quince.com slash tosh for free shipping on your order and 365 day returns now available in canada too that's q you i ncee dot com slash tosh free shipping and 365 day returns quince dot com slash tosh if your landlord hires today's guest chances are you're getting the boot please welcome the only eviction attorney I've ever sat across from in a studio where I have four squatters that work with me. Niv. Niv.

Niv. Div. You son of a vidovitch. Niv. Can I call you Niv? That is my name. So that's... Is it?

It really is. Is it? It really is. What is Niv short for? Nothing. Niv-Navanniel? No. Niv Anthony?

Eddie? My friends have come up with it. Nivonathan? Nivalodian? No. These are. We're all new, though. NIV.

NIV. Oh, by the way, are you Jewish? Yeah. Okay. What gave it away? I don't know. I thought maybe we were appropriating. Do you have any good Christian friends?

Not a whole heck of a lot. I wonder if you did if they would call you the NIV version. Oh, see, I actually get that. You do get that. I am the new international version. There you go. I love the, I tell you what, the NIV, if you're going to make me pick a version. I'm going

NIV. Yeah. Sometimes I tried to make them call me the notorious NIV. It did not work. I don't, I'm going to be honest with NIV. I love it. Yeah, that's great. The notorious NIV is a really good nickname. That's good. All right. Do you believe in ghosts? Ghosts?

It depends on your definition of ghosts, but sort of. Okay. What about squatters? You believe in squatters? I believe we should be getting rid of all the squatters, but yes, I believe in them. They're unfortunately very real. You were born in Israel, moved to Los Angeles at the age of four. What prompted that move?

Mostly my mom putting me on the airplane. It would have been hilarious if you said you were evicted. That would have been really funny. You were born in Israel to Russian parents. Yes. Did you grow up with money? Depends on what you mean by money. Okay, well, you were in the same high school as a ton of rich, famous people.

Yes, I went to Buckley. That's where a lot of celebrities sent their kids. kids. It's like, well, where the celebrity kids went. Okay. You remember Fresh Prince of Bel Air? Yeah, I remember. I remember the younger girl, the youngest sister. You know, you'd be like going to P.E. and playing ping pong with her. You guys got to play ping pong and P.E.? That right there blows my mind. We didn't get P.E. We got wall ball. That's it. I have pictures of me in the musical with Rashida Jones. Uh-huh. What musical did you guys do? Oh, we did a bunch, but the one that I was in with her was

the king and I. Were you friends with any of these famous kids? Were they nice? Or were they all awful people. No, they were actually, I mean, I wasn't friends with like Paris Hilton or, um, what's the other one? The other one that was on the show with her. Nicole Richie. Yeah, Nicole Richie. I wasn't like friends with them. She seemed a little sweeter, a little more down to earth. You said you grew up in a very traditional household, but your parents were both engineers, which makes it sound like you had two dads. No, in, uh, in Russia pretty much, there's only like four jobs that Jewish parents will let you be. Doctor? That's one. Lawyer?

That's more here, but yes. Okay. Engineer. An accountant. Accountant, that's right. If you're not one of those four things, you're pretty much a loser. Oh, that's a lot of pressure on a kid. It is.

I've managed to hit three out of four. What were the ones that you... Well, I'm a lawyer. I have an engineering degree. You actually finished your engineering degree? I thought you quit. No, no, no. I finished.

Sumakum barely, as I like to call it, but yes. That's good. You went to USC? I did. But you realized that engineering, that wasn't going to be your path. No, it was like probably one of the most traumatic experiences of my life. Why? Because it's the hardest major on the entire campus. And if you're not good at it, it's really difficult. And was it a parent immediately that you weren't good at it? Pretty apparently, yeah. Did you enjoy it though?

Is that like, or was it just pure parent guilt that forced you down that road? A lot of parent guilt. And my dad was an engineer and he said, look, I'll give you our business if you become an engineer. And I was like, well, that sounds like a fun shortcut. Do you have any siblings? Yeah, I have one sister. Uh-huh. And what does she do? She's a lawyer. I mean, listen, you guys knocked it out of the park, though. Good for you. And the fact that you could pivot and still finish.

I mean, just, but it was hard. It was atrociously difficult. And everyone else, of course, was really good at it. Like, there were classes towards, like, the junior year where it was me and, like, 25 Asian people and 25 Indian people, one token black guy, one token white girl, and the Jew. Walk into a bar. Yeah. None of these people had ever seen the inside of a bar. But, and then the teacher, several times, pretty much had the oral skills of someone who had just gotten off an airplane from wherever they were from that morning. Uh-huh. But they were so smart.

Oh, they were like ridiculously smart. They were all having a good time. Uh-huh. And I was just sitting there completely baffled. I do it with my children. I carry the anxiety of school that they're going through and stuff. that they're going to go through, it gets me worked up already. I'm just like, oh. And my parents were all like did really well in school, and, you know, they kind of expected me to do really well in school.

Did you do well or you said you barely got to me? Did you cheat? Yeah. Well, I mean, listen, it's a part of college, almost on the other. Some people aren't as honest as other people. Pivoting to law school was that enjoyable or was that like a wake-up call? you're like, oh, this is so much more up my alley. That's pretty much what it was.

I didn't get straight A's, but I got pretty good grades. But it's a ton of work. Not compared to engineering. But it is a lot of reading. Oh, it's just so much reading. It is a lot of reading, but then eventually you kind of figure out how to read the important parts quickly. Once you've gone through the seventh circle of hell, going to the first or second is like, this is a vacation. It's an upgrade.

Yeah. Oh, that's a good way to look at the afterlife. You know, if I can start at the bottom tier of hell and work my way up a few. Well, anyway, did you pass the bar exam your first time? I did. Good for you. You got to do eviction law. This couldn't be something that you were passionate about as a kid.

No. How did you even stumble into it? I started doing a little bit of it when I was first with the sole practitioner that I worked with at a law school. And then I had to do a little bit of it at like two firms later. And when I went out on my own, a lot of the people that I was trying to get business from were in the real estate business, they were people who needed to have evictions done,

so I started back up and doing evictions, and then it just kind of snowballed from there. I didn't really know about it when I was younger. I actually wanted to do entertainment law. And it couldn't be more boring, right? It is super boring. It sucks. Well, certainly, like in the music side,

is that what you were focusing on or no? Yeah, for a long time I was actually a songwriter and music producer. I don't want to bury the lead here, but Niv does have a gold record in Japan. True or false? True. Okay, explain how this is. How'd this happen?

So I was a songwriter and I was signed to a publishing company and that publishing company had a lot of contacts in Japan. And so back in the day before K-pop was like its own thing and J-pop was its own thing, American songwriters would write songs in English, produce them completely and then sell them to a Japanese artist. Uh-huh. And the Japanese songwriters would then, quote, translate your song. And what they mean by translate is write completely brand new Japanese lyrics that have nothing to do with yours.

But they will take your production and record it with Japanese voices and lyrics. And was this a one-off or was this like you just did this constantly? I had a few cuts in Japan and I went to Germany, we had to run to England, and I had a bunch of songs on TV shows and movies and stuff like that. I mean, that's great. And it all just kind of fizzled out. Well, even if it fizzled out, it's like, what a cool feather in the cap. To this day, you can't walk down the streets of Japan without being mobbed.

True or false? Probably true, but I don't know if it's because of the music. Without boring me to death, explain as someone who's never been evicted or had to file for an eviction. What exactly your job involves? The eviction part of it is very simple. There are people who rent apartments or commercial units, office spaces, warehouses, nursing homes. And as a tenant, you're required to do a certain amount of things. Number one, pay the rent.

Pay the rent on time. Pay the rent in full. It's the number on the lease. It's really easy. Okay. It seems simple. It does. Yeah, he explains it.

Uh-huh. Yeah. Two, don't break any of the rules of the lease. Okay. Three, don't be a nuisance to anybody else. Or don't use your facility that you're renting to do any illegal stuff. Gotcha. This is where L.A. becomes exciting.

People are using their rented space for God knows what. Oh, yes. Yeah. Sometimes I think God wished he didn't know what. Uh-huh. We don't have a pussyfoot around it. You're, pun intended. You're, you're talking about pornography. I have one. I have one of those. Okay. Human trafficking? That we don't have. Okay. That would be a big coup. Yeah. Yeah. With the porn. You have a title? Porn? So let's see. Uh, I get Nib pulling out his phone. So there was this one time. Mm-hmm. Oh, that list is long.

Yeah, we got an email from the client. We've still never really discovered how the client's employee discovered the pornography because he saw it on Twitter. Oh, yeah, just popped up. Now, Twitter, you know, it really, once Elon Musk took it over, it just really turned to smut. Well, it was already pretty smutty back now. Well, I guess, but now I feel like it's just disgusting. Okay.

So these people were... They saw it somehow. They were, well, this wasn't the first time. The first time that these people got complained about was because they were filming their pornography on their outdoor patio. Okay. Like up on their penthouse. Oh, the penthouse. And the building next door where children live and families live.

You don't have to make it so obvious that it's bad. Well, that's, I heard the voicemails. That's what the people were complaining about. So we told them, can you please stop having sex on camera in front of the whole city? And they said, sure, we'll stop. Okay. So then they transitioned to a much better place, which is the common stairwell of the building. What a scene.

So we told them, yeah, you got to go. Okay. And so we got them out. Give me some of your crazier tenants. Let's go. Let me see some of these crazy tenants. I'd like to list a few crazy landlords. So just recently, we had a guy who was driving all the other tenants in the building, crazy, harassing them, yelling at them.

We made a deal, we made a deal for him to leave. And in the deal, because he was trying to get government aid to go to the next. next place, he could apply for an extension to his stay, and we could oppose it if it was not reasonable for him to stay. So the day after we signed the deal, he kept doing all the same crazy stuff he was doing. And so his lawyer still asked for an extension. About a week before the hearing on the extension, this fella decided it might be a good idea to light his own apartment on fire. And then he tried to firebomb the federal courthouse. Oh, well, they went too far. But this is the best part. He did that by throwing Molotov cocktails.

at the federal courthouse, but because he's not a very good terrorist. Mm-hmm. He forgot to like the Molotov cocktails. Well, then I feel like that if I were his lawyer, yeah. I feel like there's some intent that you really have to prove. No, he's just an idiot. Okay.

Did he think it would explode when he threw it or something? He's just a crazy person. Okay. We had the guy with the katana blade who was chasing all the maintenance people with the katana blade, and so SWAT had to come and take him out. I saw the video. It was like 10 SWAT guys going up the stairs. You tell me one of the guy.

SWAT guy couldn't handle a katana blade? I don't know. It's probably safer in numbers. Could have been a master of the katana. There was the guy with the machete who came out of his apartment, saw his neighbor, and started hacking on his arm. Trejo? Danny Trejo. Danny Trejo.

We had one guy. He was such a bad hoarder that all the trash in his apartment was up to, like, the knees. Yeah. I bet you deal with that a lot. We have a lot of hoarders, and so it was so disgusting that the rats were climbing on the windows of his house.

Like we have video of the rats on the windows. I don't like any of that. That's gross. I don't like when people live like that. No. Oh, this was a good one. So this was either Riverside or San Bernardino. There was one couple that was living in an apartment. And they have your little vestibule where the mailboxes are.

So we had them on camera. One day, they were having sex. Then the next day, they were smoking meth. And then the next day, they were stealing the mail. Uh-huh. And so we had to victim. for all three things. But this was like one day.

Yeah, but you filled them on a bad three days. What if you had filled them on Sunday when they were going to Mass. We had a guy with ten automatic weapons who was threatening to kill everyone in the building and the people at his, like, weird technical school. You ever shot a gun? Yeah, of course. Are you a big gun guy? I wouldn't call myself a big gun guy, but I have some guns.

You've got guns, plural. I've never shot a gun. Really? No. Really fun. I'm sure there's a lot of things. things that are fun that I've never done. Me too.

But I'm okay. But this one's legal. Well, yeah, yeah. I think if I'm in a shooter gun, it's going to be one time and one bullet. And that's a wrap for today's episode. I mean, if I'm being honest. John Cue the lights. I feel like that might be the only time I ever am interested.

That is very dark. Sorry about that. And that's it. You're just a victim. Oh, it's far more complicated than that. Okay, we'll get into that. But at first, this profession doesn't exist. in 99% of the places in our country.

No, that's not true. That isn't true. Okay, because I always thought it was very easy to evict people in other places in the country, but here in L.A. and New York, it's impossible. L.A., New York, Washington, D.C., it's difficult. But it's not impossible. A lot of people think it's impossible.

It's not impossible. What about the White House? You think you get that guy out? He kind of tore up part of it. Do we really want to talk about politics? He's just done a... Real number on that White House. I feel like he should have signed some lease that says he can't destroy a wing.

Take away part of it. You can't just destroy a wing. But if there's someone who's destroying it and then rebuilding it, best him. Oh, why best him? Because he knows how to build stuff. Oh, does he? Yeah. All right.

Now, what's your win record? Do you even know what that is? No, and it also depends on your definition of win. Do lawyers still care about that type of stuff? Yeah, kind of. They ask me, like, how many jury trials have you? And like in the office, I would say probably win about 75% of the jury trials. What's it cost?

If somebody's calling like, hey, I got a nuisance. Yeah. We get this question all the time. Okay. So the problem is that in L.A. They've completely messed up the system. There are 16 different agencies, nonprofit agencies, who will provide a free legal defense to any tenant, as long as they're not rich.

Uh-huh. And these are people who will take very, very low-paying jobs and do. this work because they really believe in it. They're essentially political activists. Sometimes there are people who are just trying to get jury trial experience. Most of the time, they're true believers. They're like my terrorists. Oh. Okay. And they think that if you're a landlord, you are an evil person for charging people money because that should be a human right. And of course, that does not work in our society. I mean, that's the other extreme version. Maybe it's not such a hard line one way or the other, but okay, point taken. No one ever,

left the USSR or Cuba or Venezuela and said, you know, the government was really shitty, but the apartments were awesome, dude. Nobody's ever said that. Okay. Well, let's get back to it. Yeah. So these agencies, once a tenant goes to them, they really have no incentive to not drag the process out. In fact, dragging the process out is exactly what they want to do. Right. And so- more free rent or whatever the situation is. Exactly. And at the end of that process, usually we'll make a deal with them where there's some sort of a waiver of rent and we give them a little bit more time to leave because it's simply more expedient than going through the jury trial. And when you go to a jury trial, the reality is that statistically speaking, you're not going to get a jury with 12 landlords

on it. You're going to get probably 10 to 12 tenants. And of those 10 to 12 tenants, probably a vast majority of them hate their landlord. And they're going to see my client and see their own landlord sitting there. And so you're walking in handicapped already. just before you even open your mouth. Now, it doesn't make it impossible, and a lot of the time the tenants kind of do our job for them, for us by making themselves unlikable. But sometimes they are, sometimes they are likable,

and it makes it very difficult because people will feel for them. Whatever their situation is, sometimes I feel for them, is the reality. But the situation is that if they're falling on hard times and they can't pay the rent, not the landlord's job to take care of that person. There should be, you want to do government programs, Great, fantastic. But the landlord didn't sign up to be that person's caretaker.

So how long do you get in this city, if you just stop paying the rent before you can actually get them out? The average eviction takes about six months to conclude. Man. Average. That's a half year of free rent, guys. No. So all I'm hearing. The porn people I got out in six days.

They were in the penthouse. They obviously, money wasn't their issue. They were, I guess, yeah, they found some other place where people didn't mind that. But yeah, it all depends on what the story is. I've had situations that take a lot longer than six months. I have a lot of what we call pro pers. Pro purrs mean people who represent themselves. ChatGPT has made that so much more difficult because every tenant in the entire city, county, now thinks that they are Johnny Cochran.

Oh. Because they just go to chat chept. And chat GPT is the worst lawyer on the face of the planet. chat GPT just makes stuff up left and right okay one time someone called me and said oh you know does the landlord have to give me this disclosure it was a commercial lease do they have to they have to give me this disclosure about something that's on the roof i said no they don't so 10 minutes later sends me Santa Monica title 16 and it says the landlord has to make the disclosure all of a sudden i'm feeling kind of stupid like okay let me go look this up and actually see Santa Monica Code only goes to Title 14. Okay. Title 16 was made up by ChatGPT, which it grabbed from like a bunch of places put together

and then set it forth as if it was the law. And it does this with cases all the time. And actually, if you look it up, there's people who have been sanctioned because ChatGPT will make up case law, but make it look very, very real. All right, so they're not doing any... It would take five seconds to look it up to verify it.

They're not going to do that. Right. So then they can't really verify it. So then they send all this stuff. and they act as their own lawyers, and the judges bend over backwards to let them get it all out. And so a lot of those pro-pers,

who a lot of them are unfortunately mentally ill, they can drag out a UD, an awful detainer for months and months and months and cost the client thousands upon thousands of dollars. And there's just not a whole heck of a lot you can do about it because you have to go through the process. What about these people that are doing short-term that I'm always reading about? They're like doing short-term Airbnb leases,

and then they just stay for six months to a year and they can't get. I don't understand that because I feel like if I walked into my home and someone was just in my home, I would get them out of my home immediately. Right. Like with a sledgehammer or something. Maybe I don't go to that extreme, but I would. People just can't pull it off. Why are they?

Can't pull off what? How are these people staying in rentals forever? Once you get in and you're in, you have the access, let's say that person is not, is supposed to leave after a week, it's been a month, they don't pay, their credit cards fake, whatever. Okay, you call the police. The person says, I'm a tenant here. Here's my Airbnb contract. And the police will always tell you it's a civil matter, go to court. Now, in LA, there's no difference between a person who's been renting for a day or a month or a year.

Okay. What I'm saying is I don't call the police. I just go and pull that person out of my house. A, very dangerous. Well, yeah, I get that. And B, then the police will come and they'll arrest the person, they'll arrest the landlord for doing assault. Now, I can't tell you that I haven't had to get a little physical with a tenant one time.

Uh-huh. You've gotten physical. And I only say it like that. I only say you, because you don't strike me as someone that would bring it to that level. Well, what happened was this lady already got kicked out. So in other words, We went through the process.

That makes a little more sense, too. Right. Okay. So we got a judgment against her. It was a Friday. The sheriff comes. Now, there's a difference between the sheriff and the police.

It's the Los Angeles County Sheriff who actually does the lockouts, takes people out. Okay. Versus when you call 911, they send you the police. Okay. Two different agencies.

Sheriff comes on a Friday, locks her out, gets her out. Somehow, either that evening or the next morning, I think it was that evening. It's a four-story apartment building. She climbs over the outside, side of it. There's some sort of a stairwell or I don't know, she climbs her over, jumps back down to

her unit, breaks into the unit, and she's back in. Say, okay, fine, we're going to take the front door off. They take the front door off. She goes out and gets a plywood piece, the size of a door, and ties it to the front. They call the police. They say, look, we already locked her out. She is now a trespasser. Please take her out. This lady, have to hand it to her. She produces the best forged letter I've almost ever seen. And it's a forgery from the management company to her saying, sorry, we evicted you by accident. Can you please come back? So my client is showing up with the police with all the eviction papers. And she's showing up with this letter. And the police are saying, we don't know who has the forgery, the letter or your court documents. We all know who has the right one.

But okay. Right. Exactly. So they call the police three times over the course of that weekend. They refuse to take her out. So I said, okay, Monday afternoon, bring seven of your workers. How many? Seven. Okay. And we're going to good. We're going to go take care of this. We show up and she's holding the door. She's holding a rope that's tied around the door. I tell the guys take down the door. They're like, we can't. It said, cut the rope. Cut the rope. Take the door off. And I order them to go inside and start taking all of her junk out. And she's standing in the doorway. She's like, you can't come in. So I am coming in. because that's my client's unit, you're trespassing. She stood in front of the doorway and I pushed right through her.

Mm-hmm. Just I pushed her. Did you play sports? Did you play any sports growing up? Not really. Okay. I had a whole heck of a lot. Okay.

But I pushed right past her. Did you go low? No. Just went with my shoulder, you know? Like, that was it. And then she said, I'm calling the police. I said, fantastic. Please call them.

And when the police came, then this time I showed them all the documents. And I said, these are the real documents. I'm the lawyer. I evicted her. This is the document showing we got possession. You have to take her away. Two hours later, after debating this for some reason, they took her away. And we took all over junk out.

And that's how we got back possession. And this is just happening constantly. Constantly. And if you go from L.A. County to outside of L.A. County, it's like going into a different country. None of this stuff happens in San Bernardino or Riverside, barely in Orange County, or Ventura County. As soon as you get into L.A. County, it is like a. magnet. Now, I want, and why is that?

It's LA. Mm-hmm. It's, it's, it, look, I, I want to preface this by saying this, and I say this whenever I talk. 95% of tenants are absolutely lovely people. They go to work, they pay their rent on time, they follow the rules, you know, watch Netflix, go to sleep, prints, and repeat. Mm-hmm. That's all they want to do, and they're great.

The other five percent are the psychos. And I only deal with the psychos. Yeah. And so they take up all the time, all the money, and all the, energy. Well, sure. When you're talking about 5% of a city of 10 million or so, that's a lot of people. It is a lot of psychos. What's your caseload like? Are you constantly getting work? Yeah. Yeah. Do you turn work down? Every now and then. It depends on the client. Mostly, you know, sometimes the clients are crazier than the tenants, so I have to politely say no.

How much of practicing law is just theater? The trial part is, I don't know, like 30, 40% theater. Okay. And the parts that I do, which is, you know, managing. the clients, negotiating, there's a lot of theater involved. Okay. Do you ever represent people being evicted, some pro bono work type? I used to, every now and then, if it's someone from our community, we might help them out. If it's a situation where they're a landlord and a tenant, so if they are a company that is renting from someplace and using that to rent to other people, we'll sometimes make exceptions for that. But other than that, we are landlord only.

What do you say to people that want to get a bunch of rental properties as an investment? Where? In Los Angeles. Don't. This is the way I explained it. Okay. Back in 50s, 60, 70s, even the 80s, if you wanted to have a full-time job and just start investing in residential real estate apartments in L.A. as a side hustle. You could do that.

It didn't take up all your time. It didn't take up all your energy. evictions were handled within, you know, 30 days, 60 days max. There were none of these jury trials and all that stuff. And so you could do that as a side hustle without it affecting your life. Back then it was like playing, let's say, college badminton. Okay. Now, being a landlord in L.A.

is like playing in the NFL during playoffs. You have to be a professional at it, and you have to be doing this full time. otherwise you will be railroaded. Okay. Now, I have two rental properties. I'm sorry to hear that. Now, one of them has been rented by the same tenant for how long, Eddie?

14 years. 14 years. You probably got one of the 95%. But he doesn't pay top dollar at all. Okay. I'm just, I'm taking a bath. But is it worth it because it's not a headache and it's been 14 years? If he's covering the mortgage and you're,

getting your tax benefits and you're making some money. Well, there's certainly no mortgage. Oh, okay. Okay. Then you're making money. Okay. Thank you, Neb. Does renting to higher-end people, is that make it a better investment or less risky?

It's both riskier and less risky. Generally speaking, the people who are higher end, who are paying for nicer units, they are more concerned about their credit. they are less likely to run into situations where they don't have the money. And to a degree, maybe not in their personal lives, but I guess in their financial dealings, they're a lot less crazy. At the same time, it is harder to find those people to rent your units. And so your unit that's $8,000 a month may sit vacant for longer.

Yeah. And so that's where the risky part is. There's just fewer people, statistically, who can pay that amount of rent. Where do you stand on rent control? Very, very, very bad, but that's not just my opinion. Pretty much every single economic study that's ever been done, from liberal to conservative and everything in between, have always found that rent control is the best way to make rents higher. Except for the one that's under rent control. No, rent control makes rents higher, not lower.

It temporarily controls rent for that particular person, but overall, it causes rent to increase. How many areas in Los Angeles are under rent control? They're between the rent and the eviction control out of the 88 cities in L.A. County. 88 cities. Did you guys know there's 88 cities in L.A. County? I did not. I didn't know it. So out of those 88, there's something like 15 or 20 that have some kind of rent and or eviction control. Santa Monica has a good one, don't they?

The People's Republic of Santa Monica does, yes. Yeah. Have a lot of fun rules. Do you have a lot of cases that come out of there? We have a decent amount of cases, yes. And is the goal always to get rid of the rent control? Like, is that what the landlord is trying to do? You mean, like, from a political standpoint? No. If you buy into a building that has rent control already built in, are you just trying to get those tenants out? Yeah, a lot of the time, when it was easier, that was the business model, is you buy a building where all the tenants are paying very, very low below market rent.

You buy them all out, cash for keys, and you renovate the units, fill them with people who are paying market rate. And because of the differential where you bought it versus where it rents, you're making a lot of money. Right. Refinance out now that you have more equity, rinse and repeat. Back in the day, before COVID, you could buy it. a tenant out for like $12,000, and they would be super excited. And then all of a sudden, they figured out how to do math. And they realized that, oh, wait a minute, if I, it cost me an extra $1,000 a month to go across the street and rent the same crappy unit. If he gives me $12,000,

that just covers the rent differential for the year. So I haven't really won anything. And then they started demanding much, much higher amounts. Now, if you're demolishing the building, you want to redevelop it. Sometimes it's worth it to pay it. But, if you're doing that business model that I just described, a lot of the times it doesn't work. Do you have any thoughts on how to fix or at least help the housing crisis in LA? Yes. Okay. So many thoughts.

What's the quickest fix? Number one, get rid of the rent control. Number two, make a law that says, all right, everybody can build whatever you want. Whoa. Whatever you want? This is bonkers. Build however tall you want, within limits, of course. Well, okay.

That's not whatever you want. So I don't literally mean whatever you want, but not with all the restrictions that we have now in terms of height restrictions, in terms of how many square feet you can build when you're building a single family home. They have like this anti-manchinization. If you're building your own house, you can only build 45% of the covered square footage of however much square footage you have. All right. Whose business is that? What difference does it make? I don't know.

Exactly. Nobody wants to be next to an Amazon warehouse. No, but it's not an Amazon warehouse. It's just a big house. That's one example. Okay, but what about those McMansions in like West Hollywood in the flats? What difference does it make? I liked the bungalows.

But it's because you don't have to live in the bungalows. I have one. Okay. I don't live in it. There you go. Where do you live? Here. Where in Malibu?

Yeah. Okay, then. You probably live. Yeah, but the coastal commission, nothing is stricter than them. Oh, I've argued in front of them. Yeah. That was like, I'd call it a kangaroo court, but that's an. insult the kangaroos.

Are kangaroos smart animals? More than the Coastal Commission. Listen, don't you're preaching to the choir. I've gone through building permits for over four years to build the house that I live in. Yeah, it's completely insane. I actually argued in front of them, and it was strange, because I showed them that what we were doing was perfectly legal, according to the rules that are in the Venice-specific plan, which is we were doing a remodel, but remodel is defined very loosely.

So we were taking like a 1,500 square foot house, leaving one of the walls and then building a 3,000 square foot addition. That's not a remodel. Well, don't be an asshole. That's the way they wrote it. I get it, but I like that they say, you know what? I know what you're doing and no. Right.

Now, theoretically that might be true. But six out of the seven people, we're sitting there saying, look, he's right. That's the law as it is today. If we want to change it, we have to ask the city to change it. We can't rewrite the rules in the middle. of the game. The other seven were like, yeah, laws, schmaws.

Get out of here. Uh-huh. And wouldn't let us do it. Staff made a report said they are doing things right now. This new plan is perfectly legal. You should approve this. They were like, what do these guys know? They're just the people that we hired to actually be experts in this particular field. And they just said no. Why? Because a whole bunch of, you know, Snoopy neighbors came and started arguing about things that had nothing to do with the law.

So that stuff needs to do. go. They all say it here. We don't want to be Manhattan Beach. Why not? They don't want it to look like that. They want there to be acreage. Lovely. Buy that property and make it yours and then leave it open. What is? They force a certain amount of square footage. No, no. Buy it. If you as a private person want that to be nothing, then buy it and leave it nothing. But to tell someone else what to do with their property that has really nothing to do with you. Well, I mean, you can only buy so much property. You can only tell other people what to do so much. Niv, we're talking in circles.

What about the fires? What about them? Have you had work because of the displacement of people? And are you actively involved in creating an ability to actually rebuild in a way that makes sense or no? Not really involved in that. The way it's impacted my work is that because of the fires, it triggers this thing called the price gouging statute. Have you seen price gouging? Well, it depends on your definition of price gouging.

So, again, the reason, okay, so they kept the emergency open for like 11 months for a fire that they put out in January, last January. Now, the reason they like to keep these emergencies open is because when there is a state of emergency, the local government has a lot more flexibility in how they can spend their money. And it's just, it gives them a lot of power. Right. Right. They don't have to answer to as much. Right. Okay.

So the county of Los Angeles has been in. a consistent state of emergency for almost six years right now. There was COVID for like four years. Then in the city of L.A., they were like, oh, we're running out of that emergency. Let's make a homelessness emergency. So they passed a homelessness emergency. And the fires happened. So they kept that one going for 11 months. In the middle of that one, there was an ICE emergency, you know, like the immigration people. They made an emergency for that. And for a couple months, we literally had the fire and ice emergency at the same time. Okay. Well, that's just good marketing. Right, exactly. So anyway, every time they pass this emergency, not only did they get these powers, it also triggers the price gouging statute.

I started sending letters left and right to every person who they thought was price gouging. And a lot of the times they weren't. Basic rule is you're not allowed to do more than 10% of what the last rent was. Okay. But a lot of the times, let's say, you have a person who wasn't renting their house in the year prior to the emergency. And now they want to put it on the market. So if that's the case, they limit that person's. right to rent it for market. And they say you can only rent it for 160% of what the fair rental

value is according to HUD. HUD is the federal housing department. These are numbers that they set up primarily for multifamily housing, not for large homes. They don't care. There's no exception for that in the price-gatching statute. So it goes by number of rooms. So let's say you have a house in Bel Air, four bedrooms. Right, where 100,000 a month is a number that can can be thrown out. Right. They don't care. They'll take that four-bedroom house

and compare it to a four-bedroom apartment in North Hollywood. Don't do it. What happens? That's Pete's neck of the woods. North Hollywood. It's my neck of the woods too. I live in Valley Village.

Okay. Well, Pete, Pete hates saying that he lives in North Hollywood. He loves to tell people at Studio City. Right. That's why they invented Studio City because everyone got embarrassed of saying North Hollywood. Also, Valley Village, Valley Glen, Sherman Oaks.

Uh-huh. That all just used to be Van Eyes. It's just Van Eyes in North Hollywood. Pretty much. And then everyone's like, I'm not telling anyone I live in Finn Eyes. Pete, you got to embrace it. No-ho, Pete. No-ho.

8-18 is great. There you go. 8-18 till I die. So anyway, so they're telling this lady, yeah, you can only rent your house that's market value of $15,000 for $5,600. Why? Like, what does it have to do with the emergency? What does it do with the fire?

Her house is nowhere near the fire. The price she charges has nothing to do with price couching. It's just the market rent. So you handle this case? Yeah. I mean, it just seems like so much work to like be able to charge your fair market. That's my point. Uh-huh.

Is that you have to stop doing that. Interfering with the economy and interfering with the housing market is what causes disruption in the housing supply. People are being chased out of here. The city and the county governments are telling land. Lords, we don't like you. We don't want you. We don't want you to make a living.

We don't want you to do well. At the same time, please build more housing. Is your job dangerous? No. Oh. Sorry. Well, no, it just, I don't even, it just seems like it's, is it stressful? Yes.

Do you bring that home with you, the anxiety? My wife and I actually work together. So, so she's, she's really great. So she sees me at home. And yeah, I mean, it's hard not to bring it home. She helps me, you know, tame it. And I think being a person of faith also helps me control it to a degree. But it is a very large amount of stress because it's not just the laws.

I'm also handling a lot of different things in terms of being the head of the law firm. You're also the father of a dozen children. So it doesn't, it feels like a dozen children. But it's actually just five. Just five. The first time I've ever heard someone ever refer to. to five children has just five. You got to understand.

In my community, I'm lazy. Oh, how dare you? Just kidding. What's your youngest? What's your age range? 6, 8, 10, 12, 14. You guys are going to start back up again? No, factory's closed.

Oh. How large is your Sukkah in the backyard? First of all, how do you know what a Sukah is? I just going to, it's got to be a large. Five kids. It's just so big. But you only have one son. How does he handle it?

I mean, it's great. like the little prince. Does he know that he's in a world of hurt? No, I don't think so. He's pretty chill. I had older sisters. I enjoyed it. But then at some point I was like, oh, this is getting myself beat up a little bit.

They didn't teach me this side of life. Oh, I mean, they all beat each other up. Oh. Yeah. Have you ever considered evicting any of your children? There's a question I want to know. Well, no, not yet. But I think they'll probably evict themselves faster than I'll want them to leave.

Oh, isn't that the truth? anybody's on this show and they get a gift okay now okay here's what I'm giving you this I've never the only real job I ever had was Tosh point O okay and so I had to go to work every day and I had to have you know whatever carry a tachet and this one was like the first nice thing that my wife ever bought me and she couldn't wrap her head around how much she spent on it but she knew she had to buy something nice because I'm a little bougie and I didn't but anyway I'm like honey I don't need this any, Mulberry, that's a good brand. I go, I don't need this anymore. I have to give it

away to someone more professional, a satchel, there you go. Oh, wow. You're going to love this. Well, thank you. Well, thank you. I'm also a little bougie, so I appreciate this. Okay. Now, do you have a pool? Yeah. Oh, good. Okay. Any of your kids surf? No. We need Jewish kids surfing. Okay? That's my thing. I think that would be less entertaining to watch than you think it would.

I don't want to watch it. I want them to enjoy it. Okay. Okay. Anyway, So I'm going to give just this little beginner board to your kids. Oh, my gosh. And this is fine because this is a soft top. So it does, and it's an almond, I don't really like it. But it's a, they can play with it in the pool. Oh, that's fun.

Yeah, you're going to, get that off my desk. Just set that down. Though kids will love it. Thank you. Is there anything a person can do if someone is living rent free in their head? What are their options? Now, that is a very difficult one. Even I can't evict those people.

Okay. Niv, if I ever need your services, it's just going to be to get Eddie out of my place. Now I know the tricks to say. They're just delayed tricks. Eventually, I get my people. He's going to get you out. And I already know for sure that Niv could hip-check your wife out of the way. No way.

Good luck. All right. Nive, thanks for coming on. Thank you so much for having me. My pleasure. I want to thank Niv for being on the show. And if you ever, you ever see Niv in your ring cam, know that you've done a few things wrong.

Carl, you ever been evicted? Any of you ever been evicted? No. I've never been evicted. I've evicted people. Usually girlfriends. Like, okay. That was a good run.

You don't live here anymore. No. I had one just moved downstairs. That was that. She's just like, well, I'm not leaving the house. You told me to live here I'm like, okay, yeah, but that was when I liked you. How long did that last?

Until she gave up. A week? No, months. You don't give up on a winning lottery ticket like me in weeks? I said a week, but yeah. You got to roll the dice. You guys try to get a trap baby in the oven. Uh-huh.

Because I still would walk downstairs every now and then. Like what's going on down here. I'm your landlord. How you doing? Rends do. Okay. There's a what's what you call our Patreon.com slash toss show. You can see an extended interview with Niv.

The stuff that was too hot for YouTube. Are those, should I cancel my subscription? Do our Patreon? No, that girl's gone wild. No, I'd keep that going. I keep getting new DVDs every month. Oh, then I would say continue. Yeah.

Yeah, I guess. It's worth it. That was a real sketchy business. Yeah. That guy. That guy was quite a fella. He's in prison. I thought he just lived in Mexico.

Yeah. He might. He's in prison, huh? Let's find out. All right. Well, good for him. I mean, he had a dream. He did.

I'm going to drug chicks and then I film them naked and then I'm going to sell it on TV. Yeah. You know what? What I would ask. actually buy, I would buy a DVD of just the dads finding out that their daughters were on girls gone wild and just those reactions. He's gone insane. He does live in Mexico.

So he's not in jail? Not in jail. Yeah, he's in a big old palace in Mexico. I think it's like his house pops up on Airbnb, like if you want to rent something awesome in Puerto Vallarta. He filed for bankruptcy in 2013. He filed for bankruptcy? Yeah.

That doesn't mean anything. So to our president, like 20 times. I know. Okay? And he still gets to assault women. My first farewell tour. Tickets are on sale. We've added shows.

Toshoshostore.com. That place is still thriving with all kinds of sales. We got some voicemails for my wife's cousin, Amanda, aka Panda. We do. Let's see if the guys have started taking this seriously. Hey, Daniel. My name's Aaron. I'm 30 and a half years old, white.

My driver's license says I'm six feet tall, but I'm only 511, 185 pounds. I think I'd be a good match for Panda because while I don't have any horse experience, I am a zookeeper and I work with the rhinos, which are a close relative. That and a horse bit my sister when we were kids, so I've always had a respect for them. I also think the eye thing's kind of hot, so no problem there. I think you and I would get along because I'm a pretty chill guy who doesn't complain. Ah, all right. What was his name?

Aaron. Aaron, the zookeeper. Mm-hmm. That's pretty cool. That's a cool job. You got animals and stuff. He'll be handy. Yeah.

And he wants to teabagger eyes or whatever. He said he finds it kind of sexy? Yeah, he's into it. That's weird. Weird fattish, but okay. I mean, listen to each his own. Yeah, don't yuck another man's yum. All right. Well, you got another one?

Yep. Hey, Daniel. This is Ethan in Indiana. I think I'd be a great fit for Amanda. I live out here in Indiana as well. Don't have much experience with horses. I've got a couple cats, and I get along pretty well with them, so I think that would translate well. I forgot to stay behind weight.

I'm 5'10, 170. I think the only thing that might do, disqualify me is I do have an uncircumcised appendage. So if you could get with Amanda Pryor and just let her know, get back to me and let me know her opinion on that. If it's a deal breaker or not, I don't think I'd be willing to get that done at this stage of my life. But feel free to get back to me and let me know what you say. She thinks. Thanks. First of all, let me remind everybody, she doesn't get a say in this. Right. This is me. I'm in control now. She's had the first 38 years of her life to not successfully pick a partner. So now it's up to me.

Right. And I haven't, just so you know that your one disqualifier, it might be the only positive. The cats, the 510, 170, that's, you know, those, those are things I'm having to, I'm struggling with. The Indiana, that's not great. Unc circumcumcised penis, that's nice. Yep. So that is not a deal breaker. I hope people out there know that we're fine with uncircumcised penises. We almost prefer them. So bring them.

Bring them. Bring them in. Bring them in by the bag full. See you next week.