What a left wing way to describe the problem!!
Imagine that, these 'do-gooders' have been so kind, and liberal,
that they have conditioned these renters to not needing to pay rent,
and now need laws changed to help them evict so they can let others
needing help have a place to live.

from
https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/homeless/unpaid-rent-in-low-income-housing-skyrocketed-evictions-may-be-next/#:~:text=Housing%20providers%20have%20been%20meeting,lowest%20rungs%20of%20the%20ladder.

Unpaid rent in low-income housing skyrocketed, evictions may be next
April 22, 2024 at 6:00 am Updated April 22, 2024 at 6:00 am
Stephanie Austin faces eviction from her Ballard apartment in Seattle.
Austin fell behind after she lost hours at her temporary job, which she
says is why she racked up unpaid rent. (Karen Ducey / The Seattle Times)
Stephanie Austin faces eviction from her Ballard apartment in Seattle.
Austin fell behind after she lost hours at her temporary job, which she
says is why she racked up unpaid rent. (Karen Ducey / The Seattle Times)

By Greg Kim
Seattle Times staff reporter
In Seattle and across the country, nonprofits that operate low-income
housing face a skyrocketing balance of unpaid rent.

In the Seattle area, the total rent debt across all tenants is estimated
at $170 million, according to the National Equity Atlas, the vast
majority of it belonging to low-income households. Across the country,
the total is almost $10 billion.

Many housing providers say the amount of overdue rent has grown
dramatically since before the pandemic and is hurting their ability to
maintain and build more affordable housing in a region and nation that
is starved for it.

These organizations, whose missions include bringing and keeping people
off the street, have begun to evict nonpaying tenants to bring in paying
ones.

Some fear more evictions are on the way.

Housing providers have been meeting with local, state and federal
officials to come up with solutions, and in some cases, asking to make
it easier to evict tenants.

The increase in unpaid rents can be traced to the pandemic, which was a
hurricane of economic disruptions, especially at the lowest rungs of the
ladder.

But housing providers and tenant advocates differ in how much blame they
assign to people for either choosing or being unable to pay rent. That
narrative may affect how comfortable organizations and governments feel
in allowing evictions to be the release valve for this financial problem.

How bad is it?
The Seattle Housing Authority, a public housing agency, saw a threefold
increase in tenants with overdue rent over the last four years, going
from 554 tenants at the start of 2019 to 1,784 at the beginning of this
year. Currently, about 23% of tenants are behind on rent.

The Low Income Housing Institute, one of the largest homelessness
services and low-income housing providers in the state, said the number
of tenants with more than $500 in overdue rent increased nearly sixfold
over the last four years, going from 66 to 369.

Even before unpaid rents reached these levels, low-income housing
providers had been sounding the alarm on rising costs for insurance,
security, staffing and overhead outpacing their funding.

Low Income Housing Institute Executive Director Sharon Lee said the
pandemic squeezed providers further, requiring them to install air
purifiers and windows in offices and community rooms. And maintenance
and repairs that were deferred are coming due now.

Lee said rents amounted to about 60% of her organization’s income in
2019, the rest coming from government subsidies, public contracts and
private donations.

“Excessive rent loss will decimate Seattle’s community of nonprofit
housing providers,” Lee said. “We will not have the financial resources
to maintain the housing, make mortgage payments or meet the obligations
of our lenders.”

The shortfalls are also making it more difficult to add new affordable
housing, said Lisa Vatske, a director at the Washington State Housing
Finance Commission, a state agency that oversees public funding and
programs for housing.

Banks are increasing requirements for organizations to receive loans for
new affordable housing projects, according to Vatske, because they see
the unpaid rent balances as high risk, which ultimately decreases the
number of units being built.

It’s not just a Seattle problem.

According to the Public Housing Authorities Directors Association, the
percentage of rent that public housing agencies across the country were
unable to collect from tenants grew threefold between 2019 and 2022.
Rents comprise more than 30% of public housing authorities’ funding.

“This is the first time that I have ever seen such high percentages of
nonpayment of rent,” said Denise Muha, executive director of the
National Leased Housing Association, which represents low-income housing
organizations across the country that receive federal funding, where
she’s worked for almost four decades.

Choosing or unable to pay?
Much of the low-income housing industry believes that government
programs designed to shield renters from the economic impacts of the
pandemic created a habit of not paying rent.

In 2020, an eviction moratorium was enacted, where landlords were
prohibited from kicking out tenants, with few exceptions.

If a tenant stopped paying rent, their balance of unpaid rent would
grow, but they could stay in their home for as long as the moratorium
was in effect. Then, pandemic relief funds provided one-time rental
assistance that wiped the slate clean for many tenants.

Housing providers said a significant number of tenants are still not
paying because they got used to spending their income on other needs or
may be hoping for more rental assistance.

Unpaid rent in low-income housing skyrocketed, evictions may be next

“It’s kind of conditioned people not to pay,” said Michael Bailey,
executive director of Compass Housing Alliance, a homelessness services
and affordable housing provider. “We see people receiving income and not
putting that to rent.”

The Seattle Office of Housing doesn’t buy it.

“They’re just unable, actually, to pay rent because the rents have been
increasing so quickly,” said Maiko Winkler-Chin, director of the Seattle
Office of Housing.

For people living in permanent supportive housing, public housing and
housing subsidized by government vouchers, rent can be free to the
tenant or set at a percentage of their income, with the government
subsidizing the rest.

But for a significant number of low-income housing units, rents soared
during the pandemic due to their wealthier neighbors earning more.

For affordable housing built using federal tax credits — there are about
45,000 units in King County — the federal government sets the maximum
amount of rent that can be charged using a formula tied to an area’s
median income.

In Seattle and King County, the median income spiked during the pandemic
due to “very high wage earners skewing the top,” said Nona Raybern,
communications manager at Seattle’s Office of Housing. That resulted in
maximum rents increasing by about 36% in the last five years.

Earlier this year, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development
capped yearly rent increases for affordable housing units built using
federal tax credits to 10%. A state bill to cap yearly rent increases to
7% passed the House this year, but ultimately died in the Senate.

“I don’t really see the case where the tenant stopped paying for no
reason,” said Edmund Witter, senior managing attorney for the Housing
Justice Project in King County, which provides free legal assistance to
renters facing eviction.

Witter said the most common reasons people stop paying rent are job
loss, injury, death in their family or child care issues. Reviewing
cases in February, he said the average unpaid rent balance of his
clients was about $4,100.

One of his clients, Stephanie Austin, 45, who used to sneak into Sea-Tac
Airport to sleep when she was homeless, moved into a permanent
supportive housing unit operated by Plymouth Housing at the end of 2022.
At the time, she had a temporary, part-time job as a cashier and cook
primarily at the stadiums downtown, through Uplift Northwest, a Seattle
nonprofit temporary staffing organization.

Based on that income, Plymouth determined she could pay $64 in rent per
month. But within a few months of moving in, Austin’s hours at her job
fell off, and she fell behind on rent.

Selena Tan, a senior associate at PolicyLink who studies rent debt, said
month-to-month fluctuations in income are common among low-income
households, and that the economic shock of the pandemic made them more
likely.

Earlier this year, Plymouth filed an eviction case against Austin for
the $626 in overdue rent she owed.

Plymouth said it could not discuss any specific tenant’s case, but said
it decided last month it would not evict any tenants with zero income
even if they had unpaid rent. Austin said that she could have spent the
energy and time fighting the eviction to find a job.

How it ends
As of the end of March, Plymouth had evicted four tenants for nonpayment
of rent since the end of the eviction moratorium and was in the process
of evicting 71 others.

On Wed, 24 Apr 2024 14:40:17 -0700, a425couple <a425couple@hotmail.com>
wrote:

>Unpaid rent in low-income housing skyrocketed, evictions may be next

Shrug! It is a landlords market across the USA. Those evicted can erect a
tent and the LL's can raise the rent to make more profit from the next
tenants.