It’s difficult to gauge how much damage the coronavirus pandemic has done to the rental housing market.
According to a national survey by the National Multifamily Housing Council, a trade group representing landlords, 78.2% of apartment households made a full or partial rent payment by Nov. 6. That’s roughly the same percentage the council saw before the pandemic.
That statistic obscures much of the financial pain being experienced by landlords whose tenants are months in arrears on their rent, as well as by renters whose lives or livelihoods were disrupted by Covid-19.
New York State’s moratorium on evictions is set to expire on Jan. 15. Tenant advocates are lobbying Gov. Kathy Hochul’s administration to extend the moratorium, but it’s time to start removing this artificial constraint on the rental housing market and allow federal assistance to provide whatever additional protection is needed.
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The eviction moratorium has no doubt saved hundreds of cash-strapped renters from losing their place to live. However, thanks to the easy availability of vaccines, we’re no longer in the lockdown phase of the pandemic. Jobs are going begging, so anyone who wants to work should be able to find employment.
Landlords are protected from having their properties foreclosed upon during the eviction moratorium, but they still have to pay their bills. Putting good landlords out of business does our community a disservice and endangers an unsettled economy.
Kevin Glover directs the Hope Center on Paderewski Drive, where landlords and tenants have sought help applying for emergency rental aid. Glover told The News’ Jay Tokasz that some renters were behind on their rent by as much as $17,000, while some landlords are owed tens of thousands of dollars in rent.
Thanks to federal funding, the state’s Emergency Rental Aid Program, or ERAP, received $2.4 billion to help tenants and landlords. About half of that has been distributed.
The state also provided $250 million for the Landlords Rental Assistance Program, to pay rent for tenants who did not apply for aid themselves.
ERAP requires landlords and tenants to cooperate in applying for the funds, which can cover up to 15 months of back rent. Several landlords told The News that some of their tenants refused to communicate with them. The eviction moratorium may have removed any incentive to cooperate from some tenants, who figured they had little to lose. That’s one reason why the moratorium can’t go on indefinitely.
Not all landlords are innocent victims, of course. Some drive their tenants away by creating unsafe or unsanitary conditions on their properties, a form of soft eviction that is harder to challenge legally. Rising demand for rental units in some neighborhoods makes it more profitable for owners to open their apartments to new renters who will pay higher rates.
The ERAP program helps both tenants and landlords, but applying for the funds and getting them are different things. Delays in processing applications and distributing payments have been common.
The News reported that the ERAP program has received more than 280,000 applications since June 1 with requests for aid that exceed the $2.4 billion. By mid-November, many applications were no longer being accepted.
Hochul has asked the federal government for nearly $1 billion more toward emergency rental aid.
Needy homeowners will also get the chance to apply for assistance under a new program that Hochul announced Monday. The New York State Homeowner Assistance Fund will give out $539 million to low- and moderate-income homeowners who are behind on housing-related payments.
The state will start accepting applications on Jan. 3 in the program created through the American Rescue Plan Act.
More federal funding for ERAP could cushion the blow for tenants when the eviction moratorium expires, as well as provide some financial stability for landlords. Both renters and those who depend on rent deserve a lifeline to see them through tough times. With the amount of federal aid flowing to New York State, there’s no reason that the rental market should be allowed to collapse and to undermine the rest of the state economy.
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