Ruth Schwartz knew things had gotten out of hand when a tiny house suddenly appeared in her front yard last summer.

It had already been a year, according to an eviction lawsuit filed by Schwartz, since she’d gotten a rent check from the tenant living on the other side of her bedroom wall.

The longtime Oakland resident and lesbian dating coach had filed an eviction suit just before the pandemic — and then came the emergency eviction moratorium, a legal battle at her Oakland hills home and the shed that Schwartz alleges the tenant built while she was gone.