The China Mail - Los Angeles fire evacuees face price gouging

"The price gouging is going haywire, it's obscene," the 50-year-old stylist told AFP.

"I can't find anywhere for us to go."

Huge fires that have torn through Los Angeles since Tuesday have levelled whole neighborhoods, turning swathes of the city to ash.

More than 150,000 people have been ordered to leave their homes as authorities try to keep down a death toll that has already reached 16.

One blaze devastated Pacific Palisades, an upmarket enclave that was home to celebrities like Billy Crystal and Kate Beckinsale, which -- until this week -- was some of the most desirable real estate in the United States.

With the area now under a compulsory evacuation order, even those whose homes survived the inferno need to go elsewhere for the forseeable future.

The higher-than-average incomes of people forced to leave homes there appears to have tempted chancers, who see the opportunity to make money from others' misery.

"We put in an application at a house... that was listed at $17,000 a month, and they told us if we didn't pay $30,000, we weren't going to get it," Lieberman said.

"They told me they have people ready to offer more and pay cash. It's absolutely insane."

- Illegal -

Similar stories of apparent price gouging abound.

"I have friends who booked a hotel outside Los Angeles, and when they arrived there, they were asked for a higher price," said TV producer Alex Smith, who has been forced to leave his home.

The sharp practice has drawn the ire of California's Attorney General Rob Bonta, who warned Saturday there are laws against it.

"Price gouging is illegal. We will not stand for it. We will hold you accountable. We will prosecute," he told reporters, adding those found guilty could land themselves a year in jail.

Once a state of emergency is declared -- as it has been for the out-of-control fires -- vendors cannot increase their prices by more than 10 percent.

That applies to small businesses as well as to mega companies whose automated tools use supply and demand to set the cost of everything from hotel stays to concert tickets.

"If those algorithms lead to prices higher after the declaration of emergency than before, by more than 10 percent, you're violating the law," he said.

"You need to figure out how to adjust your prices consistent with the law. And if that means departing from your algorithm, depart from your algorithm."

For Brian, a retiree who has been sleeping in his car since the evacuation order was raised, the short term rules protecting against price gouging are almost beside the point.

The 69-year-old, who did not want to give his full name, has been living in a rent-controlled studio apartment in Pacific Palisades for two decades.

That has now gone, along with it the guarantee that his rent cannot rise.

His pension, he fears, will not stretch far in a city where rents have doubled in the last 10 years -- a problem likely to be exacerbated by the sudden rush of people needing somewhere new to live.

"I'm back on the market with tens of thousands of people," he said.

"That doesn't bode well."

Z.Huang--ThChM