(Atlanta) Millions of tenants have been evicted from their homes or face possible eviction in the United States.
After a slowdown during the pandemic, the number of eviction requests is on the rise. The phenomenon is fueled by rising rents and a shortage of affordable housing. Returning to a normal life is difficult for many low-income people. Not only do they no longer receive the aid put in place during the pandemic, but their income does not keep pace with inflation.
As a result, homelessness is on the rise.
“The protections are no longer there, the moratorium imposed by the federal government is no longer in place. Funds for rental support are dry in many places, notes Daniel Grubbs-Donovan of Princeton University. Across the country, low-income renters are worse off than before the pandemic due to steep rent increases and other pandemic-induced financial hardship. »
According to Princeton University’s Eviction Lab, which studies cases in about 30 cities and 10 states, requests for evictions have increased by more than 50% in some places. Homeowners request approximately 3.6 million evictions per year.
The research center reports increases of 56% in April and 50% in May in Houston. In Minneapolis/St. Paul, the number of requests more than doubled in March, increased by 55% in April and 63% in May. The increase was 35% in Nashville and 33% in Phoenix in May.
The latest data follows a trend that began last year when Eviction Lab observed nearly 970,000 eviction requests in the cities it monitors, up 78.6% from 2021, a year in which a moratorium on evictions was in effect.
Rents have increased by an average of 5% across the United States over the past year. The increase amounts to 30.5% compared to 2019, according to the real estate company Zillow. People evicted from their homes have few places to move: the National Low Income Housing Coalition estimates the lack of affordable housing at 7.3 million nationwide.
The disturbing rise in evictions at a pre-pandemic level is a wake-up call that it is time to act, at all levels of government, so that people can have a home.
Ayanna Pressley, Representative
Mme Pressley is urging Congress to pass a bill tackling illegal evictions, establishing a legal fund to help tenants and removing eviction from credit scores.
In upstate New York, the number of evictions has also been on the rise since the moratorium ended last year. Forty of the state’s 62 counties received more applications in 2022 than before the pandemic. In two of them, the number more than doubled compared to 2019.
“How do you deal with these people who have been evicted when the capacity is not in place, especially in places where there have been few evictions recently? asks Russell Weaver of Cornell University.
Tenants’ rights advocates hope the state Legislature — controlled by Democrats — will pass a bill that will require landlords to justify every tenant eviction. They also want to limit the increase in rents to 3% or to a rate of 1.5% above inflation. However, this bill was withdrawn from the budget and parliamentarians failed to pass it before the end of the session.
“The state legislature should have been more vigorous,” said Oscar Brewer, a tenants’ rights advocate.
In Texas, rents soared following the end of the moratorium. The number of eviction requests jumped to 270,000, a record high.
Tenants’ rights advocates hoped in vain for the state Legislature to provide aid using part of the $32 billion budget surplus
“It’s a big mistake to miss the opportunity,” said Ben Martin, a research director for the nonprofit Texas Housers. If we don’t deal with it now, the crisis will only get worse. »