ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on the legal controls of residential rents, their differential impressions of fairness upon the landlords, and the relationships between these and violations of rent ceilings in Honolulu in 1952. The competition between landlords is supposed to protect the tenant against the charge of extortionate rents. Three classes of landlords were created by the three ceilings, and one individual, of course, could belong in more than one class simultaneously: landlords with fair-rent-date ceilings, landlords with fair-return ceilings and landlords with new-construction ceilings. The original expressed intent of the rent-control ordinance was to produce rents which would be fair to both landlords and tenants. The ceilings of this class of rental accommodations were to be determined by the Rent Control Commission upon the basis of the rent and services "generally prevailing for comparable housing accommodations" on the fair-rent date.
