Here’s What That Taught Me About the Holes in our Social Safety Net
The unsettling truth is far worse than I imagined…
If you missed my previous post, I will try to sum up last month’s debacle quickly and concisely in order to present new information as I uncover it. If you want the long story on how and why I was almost evicted despite the moratorium, you can read it here. In brief, I was diagnosed with breast cancer in February of 2020, 11 days after giving birth to my son Ibraheem.
They say that most families are one disaster away from homelessness, but not ours. Unlike most Americans, my hubby and I had some savings set aside in case of an emergency. But when the time came, we witnessed multiple emergencies ranging from unexpected expenses and escalated copays to missing weeks of work from coming down with COVID-19.
Over the course of the entire year of 2020, we scraped by. Through Allah’s mercy, we never missed a rental payment or even submitted one late.
Then came January of 2021…
We all came down with COVID-19. Immediately we informed our landlord via email and explained that our rent would be late because my husband was not allowed to return to work because of the virus.
We were led to believe, through email correspondence, that everything was fine. So, you can imagine our surprise when on January 11th, our landlord, a noted global apartment leader, sent us a letter giving us five days to pay the rent or vacate. This is what the letter looked like:
In a coming post, God willing, I will go over the letter in finite detail and point out everything about it that was illegal. For now, suffice it to say that this experience taught me countless lessons about the holes in America’s so-called safety net.
Read on to learn about the harsh realities that hit me only at the time my world was in peril.
What I Thought: $25 billion in rent relief is available for renters at risk for eviction.
What the Truth is: $25 billion in rent relief is anticipated to be made available at some point in the future. As for now, there’s no money and everything’s on hold.
Upon receiving this self-help eviction letter, I immediately contacted the Delaware State Housing Authority. I was greeted by the perplexing message I have embedded into this post. I was of the understanding that rent relief was being made available to renters like me who were at risk of homelessness through eviction.
Quickly, I learned that the Delaware Housing Authority has no funds to speak of to date. They are not even accepting applications for rent relief:
This information isn’t new. After some digging, I learned it has been this way since December 31st. That’s almost a month’s worth of American renters falling through a safety net that was purchased at the expense of taxpayer dollars but has, in reality, yet to be fastened.
What I Thought: The eviction moratorium is protecting renters from being evicted.
What the Truth is: Landlords are still evicting despite the moratoriums.
During a recent call on homelessness and Coronavirus, President and CEO of NLIHC Diane Yentel discussed the urgent need for strengthening eviction moratoriums. I could not more strongly agree.
The current moratoriums are not worth the sold-out toilet paper they were written on. Landlords are still evicting left and right – in the dead of winter, in the middle of the pandemic, and despite the eviction moratoriums.
Contrary to what’s being shown in the media, these aren’t rogue landlords committing these crimes. It’s the big guys, the multi-billion dollar “investment entities” doing the deed, which leads into my next order of correction.
What I Thought: Only rogue landlords operating small clusters of rental units are breaking the law by breaking the moratoriums.
What the Truth is: Big real estate companies are breaking the law by breaking the moratoriums.
Up until now, the heartless landlord stories I reported featured rogue agents with just a handful of properties standing around in barns painted the shade of confederate flags and shaking their fists at all the Marxism and communism that, from their perspective, is being steeped into modern day America. This is the picture of heartless landlords that was painted for me by the media.
As such, I wrongly assumed that this was where the big eviction crisis was coming from. I was gravely mistaken, for which I apologize. That was very assumptive of me and I usually pride myself on conducting thorough research and avoiding generalizations. Now that I know better, I will do better by informing people of big real estate and their violent crimes against humanity.
What I Thought: Numbers projected by researchers and advocates reflect the true number of evictions that are being carried out and/or filed.
What the Truth is: Nobody is tracking self-help evictions – the tactic most multi-billion-dollar investment entities resort to in order to scare people out of their homes.
This finding is statistically significant because it means there are even more evictions taking place than the 241,349 pending evictions currently being tracked. Since these investment entities maintain hundreds of thousands of rental units, it’s safe to assume their properties are home to millions of hard-working Americans.
According to this new finding, my previous report that tens of millions of Americans are in danger of becoming evicted once the moratoriums expire was incorrect. In reality, tens of millions of American renters are in danger of being illegally evicted right now. As I write this, many are packing their belongings and evacuating their homes due to an overabundance of misinformation and rhetoric.
What I Thought: Renters are being made aware of their rights.
What the Truth is: People in authority are largely unaware of renter rights and feel no sense of responsibility to educate renters or themselves.
As I mentioned earlier, upon receiving my illegal notice to evacuate, I immediately contacted the Delaware State Housing Authority.
The woman on the other end of the phone, whose name I did not write down, informed me it was legal for landlords to evict residents for being late with their rent, even if this lateness was the result of COVID-19, and even while a moratorium was in place.
It wasn’t until I called back and identified myself as a reporter for Invisible People that I was told the letter was illegal. This raises serious questions about the level of misinformation being doled out to unwitting renters nationwide.
What I Thought: COVID positive patients are not being evicted.
What the Truth is: COVID positive patients are being told to “pay the rent or get out” and release their illness on the world.
Since the onset of the pandemic, our apartment community has shut down all of our amenities under the guise that they care about human lives and want the best health outcomes for everyone. This is why the internet café hasn’t been open in almost a year, why the pool was shut down all summer, why the gym features limited access.
However, in a bitter twist of irony, our landlord who expressed so much concern about flattening the curve and keeping the virus at bay, attempted to evict us with the knowledge that we were all positive for COVID-19. It’s hypocritical to fain compassion for the public when it fuels your corporate greed, only to show your true colors when somebody’s rent is eleven days late.
Make Sure Your Voice is Heard
Please keep this story in mind when big real estate begins pedaling for bailouts from people like you.
If you have a story like mine but you lack the platform to tell it, you can contact me directly at [email protected] or message me on Twitter. There are times in my life when I’m running to chase down a story, but I find that my best stories are always the ones that find their way to me. Stay tuned as I continue on my personal saga and try to answer pivotal questions like:
- Who’s responsible for preventing eviction?
- How does a family facing eviction obtain legal aid?
- Where is the rent relief money? And more.
Breaking: I Will Now Attempt to Track Self-Help Evictions
I must warn you though, that I am just a humble blogger with a vested interest in reducing/ending homelessness. I intend to start tracking illegal evictions with the hope that more experienced researchers will follow my lead and get a real, semi-accurate count going.
If you’ve been a victim of a self-help eviction during the pandemic, please reach out to me via the email address I listed above. If your growing concern about the eviction crisis was further solidified by reading this blog post, contact your representatives and start asking them the tough questions we all deserve answers to.
*Update: Since publishing this post, certain names have been removed for legal purposes. While I cannot get into the specific details, I will say that this is a great example of how current laws lean heavily in favor of landlords over tenants and how our so-called “freedom of speech” comes at a price most everyday American workers cannot afford to pay. #NoBailouts4BigRealEstate
