[Senate Hearing 117-742]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]


                                                    S. Hrg. 117-742


                  ``THE RENT EATS FIRST'': HOW RENTERS AND 
                     COMMUNITIES ARE IMPACTED BY TODAY'S  
                     HOUSING MARKET

=======================================================================

                                HEARING

                               BEFORE THE

                              COMMITTEE ON
                   BANKING,HOUSING,AND URBAN AFFAIRS
                          UNITED STATES SENATE

                    ONE HUNDRED SEVENTEENTH CONGRESS

                             SECOND SESSION

                                   ON

              EXAMINING HOW TO MAINTAIN AFFORDABLE HOUSING

                               __________

                             AUGUST 2, 2022

                               __________

  Printed for the use of the Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban 
                                Affairs
                                
[GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]                                


                Available at: https: //www.govinfo.gov /

                              __________

                                
                    U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE                    
53-563 PDF                   WASHINGTON : 2023                    
          
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------     

            COMMITTEE ON BANKING, HOUSING, AND URBAN AFFAIRS

                     SHERROD BROWN, Ohio, Chairman

JACK REED, Rhode Island              PATRICK J. TOOMEY, Pennsylvania
ROBERT MENENDEZ, New Jersey          RICHARD C. SHELBY, Alabama
JON TESTER, Montana                  MIKE CRAPO, Idaho
MARK R. WARNER, Virginia             TIM SCOTT, South Carolina
ELIZABETH WARREN, Massachusetts      MIKE ROUNDS, South Dakota
CHRIS VAN HOLLEN, Maryland           THOM TILLIS, North Carolina
CATHERINE CORTEZ MASTO, Nevada       JOHN KENNEDY, Louisiana
TINA SMITH, Minnesota                BILL HAGERTY, Tennessee
KYRSTEN SINEMA, Arizona              CYNTHIA LUMMIS, Wyoming
JON OSSOFF, Georgia                  JERRY MORAN, Kansas
RAPHAEL WARNOCK, Georgia             KEVIN CRAMER, North Dakota
                                     STEVE DAINES, Montana

                     Laura Swanson, Staff Director

                 Brad Grantz, Republican Staff Director

                       Elisha Tuku, Chief Counsel

                 Dan Sullivan, Republican Chief Counsel

                      Cameron Ricker, Chief Clerk

                      Shelvin Simmons, IT Director

                        Pat Lally, Hearing Clerk

                                  (ii)


                            C O N T E N T S

                              ----------                              

                        TUESDAY, AUGUST 2, 2022

                                                                   Page

Opening statement of Chairman Brown..............................     1
        Prepared statement.......................................    36

Opening statements, comments, or prepared statements of:
    Senator Toomey...............................................     3
        Prepared statement.......................................    37

                               WITNESSES

Matthew Desmond, Maurice P. During Professor of Sociology and 
  Director of the Eviction Lab, Princeton University.............     6
    Prepared statement...........................................    39
    Responses to written questions of:
        Chairman Brown...........................................    80
Laura Brunner, President and CEO, Port of Greater Cincinnati 
  Development Authority..........................................     7
    Prepared statement...........................................    53
    Responses to written questions of:
        Chairman Brown...........................................    86
        Senator Smith............................................    89
Rosanna Morey, Small Property Owner..............................     9
    Prepared statement...........................................    58
Darion Dunn, Managing Partner, Atlantica Properties..............    10
    Prepared statement...........................................    59
Diane Yentel, President and CEO, National Low Income Housing 
  Coalition......................................................    12
    Prepared statement...........................................    61
    Responses to written questions of:
        Chairman Brown...........................................    91
        Senator Smith............................................    94

                                 (iii)

 
 ``THE RENT EATS FIRST'': HOW RENTERS AND COMMUNITIES ARE IMPACTED BY 
                         TODAY'S HOUSING MARKET

                              ----------                              


                        TUESDAY, AUGUST 2, 2022

                                       U.S. Senate,
          Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs,
                                                    Washington, DC.
    The Committee met at 10 a.m., via Webex and in room 538, 
Dirksen Senate Office Building, Hon. Sherrod Brown, Chairman of 
the Committee, presiding.

          OPENING STATEMENT OF CHAIRMAN SHERROD BROWN

    Chairman Brown. The Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, 
and Urban Affairs will come to order.
    Before we begin I will probably embarrass her but want to 
call her out. Irene Gray is working her last week as a 
stenographer in the U.S. Senate. She has been here 27 years, 
and we thank her for her quiet, effective, really crucial work 
to preserve the hearings. Even when Senator Toomey and I do not 
say much of note, she still has to take it down. So we just 
appreciate your good work for this country and your unsung hero 
as a public servant, contracted or not, as a public servant, so 
thank you. Thank you.
    This hearing is in a hybrid format. Four of our witnesses 
are joining us in person, sitting in front of Senator Toomey 
and me. Ms. Morey is joining remotely. One or more of our 
Committee colleagues may attend from their office.
    Yesterday was the first of the month. For millions of 
Americans, that means the rent was due. For many renters, that 
rent keeps going up and up and up.
    Two weeks ago in this Committee we heard from witnesses 
about the soaring cost of housing and how it hurts the millions 
of families priced out of buying their first home, and imperils 
the renters who are just one illness or job loss or car repair 
away from eviction, as one of our witnesses documented in his 
book.
    This problem is squeezing people all across the country, 
working all kinds of jobs, even jobs that were supposed to be a 
ticket to the middle class.
    This is not a new problem.
    For decades, so many Americans have struggled to scrape 
together the rent each month. Too many have lived in shoddy 
housing with rodents, mold, or broken appliances.
    That is why, 90 years ago, this country began investing in 
affordable housing, so that everyone would have a safe, 
affordable place to live. But the funding we put into that 
effort has never kept up with renters' needs, or even the basic 
maintenance of aging federally assisted housing.
    For the past decade, about half of renters have been paying 
more than one-third of their incomes just to keep a roof over 
their heads, and we know renters' challenges are only getting 
worse.
    We are 3.8 million homes short of what we need. Not a 
single State in the country has enough housing. And for the 
lowest-income renters, there are just 36 units affordable and 
available for every 100 renters who need them. That means 
renters cannot, as we might say, vote with their feet in the 
housing market because there is nowhere for them to go.
    This huge shortage of housing means that renters have to 
make do with what they have got, even if their house has 
dangerous lead paint on the walls, or the landlord will not fix 
the heat, or their bathtub has been clogged for weeks. With 
housing so difficult to find, renters are forced to ask 
themselves whether it is worth it to push for a repair from the 
same person who can put an eviction on their record and decide 
whether they have a place to sleep at night.
    The shortage of housing also means rents are going up for 
pretty much everyone. Rents are up 15 percent nationally, 
compared to a year ago. In some cities, like Austin, Texas, or 
Senator Menendez on this Committee, his city of Newark, rents 
are up more than 25 percent. When rents rise, it makes 
everything in someone's life just a little bit more precarious. 
More and more families are just one emergency away from losing 
their home.
    Renters see the pain from all these rent increases--the 
missed trips to visit family, the car repair they are forced to 
put off, the second job they have to take--just to make ends 
meet.
    Wall Street investors just see opportunity. They do not see 
the pain, or they just do not care. More and more, investors 
are buying up single-family homes, homes that first-time 
homebuyers usually buy, and renting them out at sky-high rates. 
Twenty-eight percent of homes sold at the beginning of this 
year went to investors.
    Think about that. Investors, too often from out of town, 
who do not care about the community and just want to make a 
quick buck, are buying more than a quarter of homes, not bought 
by families who want to put down roots, who dream of seeing 
their kids grow up in that neighborhood and go to that local 
school.
    That number is up from 16 percent just a couple of years 
ago. And the biggest investors with the deepest pockets--the 
ones who own more than 100 properties--nearly doubled their 
share of these purchases.
    Ms. Brunner has seen it first-hand in Cincinnati, where a 
single company based in Texas bought up 29 properties on one 
street in Price Hill, 29 properties on a single street. In that 
neighborhood now, more than half of all homes are now rentals. 
And the city is left to chase down these out-of-State landlords 
who are letting these homes fall apart.
    Families need a landlord they can talk to, who lives in the 
community. Cities need landlords who want to actually take care 
of their buildings and help families stay in their homes. But 
big Wall Street firms promising investors double-digit yields 
and running up double-digit eviction rates are pricing out 
those who make a community home, good landlords, renters, 
first-time homebuyers alike.
    And they are not just buying up single-family homes. They 
are targeting mobile home communities and apartment buildings--
we see that across the country--anywhere that adds to their own 
bottom lines.
    Last week, the House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus 
Crisis published a report showing that, at the height of the 
pandemic, just four of these massive landlords--four--filed 
nearly 15,000 evictions--4 landlords, 15,000 evictions.
    When a renter who has fallen behind on rent or cannot get 
her landlord to fix her heat, we often hear that it is her 
individual problem. We hear that it is just between the renter 
and his landlord, or that his local Government is to blame for 
its bad policies.
    And it is true that every eviction, every rent hike, every 
unlivable home is a personal crisis for an individual family. 
But all of these individual crises have added up to a big, 
national problem. It costs all of us more in education costs 
when kids have to change schools every 6 months or so. It costs 
all of us in lost productivity when the workers supporting our 
businesses and schools, and our first responders, cannot find 
an affordable place to live. It costs all of us more in health 
care when people cannot store their medicine because they do 
not have a place to live.
    This is not someone else's problem. It affects all of us, 
and we need to work together to solve it. We have to expand the 
supply of safe, affordable housing across the country, for 
renters and homeowners, at all income levels. We have to 
maintain the affordable housing we currently have, so we do not 
fall even further behind on our housing supply. And we have to 
help renters find and remain in homes they can afford with 
financial assistance, including emergency assistance, and 
support bipartisan eviction prevention efforts, like mediation, 
through the Bipartisan Eviction Crisis Act.
    I look forward to hearing from our witnesses today about 
how we can tackle these challenges facing renters and grow the 
number of good landlords. It will benefit all of us.
    Senator Toomey.

         OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR PATRICK J. TOOMEY

    Senator Toomey. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Let me join the 
Chairman in recognizing and thanking Ms. Irene Gray for her 
years of service to the Committee, to the Senate, and to the 
country. We really do appreciate your good, solid, consistent 
hard work. Thank you.
    The fact is, across America, every month Americans are 
falling further and further behind because of President Biden's 
out-of-control inflation. Paychecks are not keeping up with 
rising prices. After adjusting for inflation, wages have 
declined 5 percent since President Biden took office. The fact 
is, working Americans are getting poorer every day.
    And our Democratic colleagues' wasteful spending, growth-
killing regulation, and excessively accommodative monetary 
policy are exactly what caused 40-year high inflation and now 
an economic contraction. And what is the response we hear from 
our Democratic colleagues? They want to jam through a reckless 
tax-and-spending bill that will make this disastrous situation 
even worse.
    Hiking corporate taxes will slow economic growth and 
especially harm America's manufacturing sector, and spending 
billions more will fuel inflation. This new wasteful spending 
will mostly go toward corporate welfare for green energy, 
subsidies for wealthy people to buy Teslas, and a political 
handout right before the elections to higher-income Americans 
who buy Obamacare plans.
    In addition, the bill includes spending on housing, which 
is the topic of today's hearing. Under the Biden 
administration, of course, the cost of housing has skyrocketed. 
Housing prices increased 18 percent in the last 12 months. 
Rents have jumped 14 percent. Affordable housing is growing 
further and further out of reach for many.
    But you would not know that from reading the Democrats' 
bill. Its housing provision creates a $1 billion slush fund for 
``greening'' subsidized housing. I guess the theory is at a 
time of surging housing costs the solution is to put solar 
panels on Section 8 housing.
    As I have said before, Government, and especially this 
Administration, have often been the problem, not the solution, 
when it comes to housing. There are countless ways that 
needless Government regulation drives up housing costs. Time-
consuming permitting processes drive up the cost of building 
new rental housing. Overly burdensome environmental impact 
reviews further add to that cost.
    Tariffs on steel, lumber, and other building materials have 
the same effect. Rent control laws reduce the supply and 
quality of rental housing. Demand-side housing subsidies get 
capitalized into higher house prices and higher rents.
    Loose GSE and FHA underwriting standards drive those house 
prices and rents still higher. The GSEs then respond by 
subsidizing investors in single-family rental housing, but that 
just further drives up house prices and crowds out aspiring 
homeowners.
    More recently, the Democrats and this Administration have 
taken this Government failure to the next level. They have 
dropped hundreds of billions of dollars of helicopter money to 
stimulate an already strong economy. Eighty billion of that 
went to rental assistance, vouchers, and other housing 
subsidies, further inflaming demand.
    The President even extended the illegal eviction moratorium 
that has deterred investment in new rental housing and led to 
some renters not paying rent even when they could afford to. 
Predictably, landlords have responded by increasing rents and 
requiring larger security deposits.
    Today the Democrats will propose more of the same. We will 
likely hear them make the case for new so-called tenant 
protections. We will likely hear them arguing for making the 
COVID rental assistance program permanent.
    But doubling down on failed liberal housing policies is not 
going to fix our rental housing market. Instead it will just 
make housing more expensive. Today we will also hear from 
landlords about how Government intervention makes it harder and 
more expensive to be a landlord, and that leads to higher costs 
for renters.
    To improve housing affordability for all Americans whether 
renters or owners we should pursue reforms that leverage the 
power of free enterprise to increase housing supply and make 
markets more competitive. A healthy market competes not just on 
price but also service and product quality. To that end, we 
should scale back the role of Government and increase the role 
of private capital.
    We should avoid the temptation to adopt new so-called 
tenant protections or permanent rental assistance that will 
have negative unintended consequences, including increasing 
housing costs. We should phaseout demand-side subsidies that 
drive housing costs higher. We should end the failed GSE model 
that fosters excessive risk-taking and contributes to a boom/
bust housing cycle.
    Localities should revisit their permitting processes and 
other obstacles to new housing construction. We should prohibit 
the GSEs and other Federal programs from subsidizing rental 
units in jurisdictions that impose rent controls, and we should 
get the GSEs out of the business of subsidizing single-family 
home investors. And we should keep the GSEs focused on their 
affordability missions by keeping them out of social policy.
    Meanwhile, I hope the Administration will finally engage on 
housing reform. Treasury has still not met its obligation to 
deliver a housing reform plan to Congress. It is now 10 months 
overdue.
    Instead of pushing a reckless tax-and-spending bill, the 
Administration should look to opportunities for bipartisan 
legislation, like housing finance reform, that relies on free 
enterprise, not Government, to make housing affordable for all 
Americans, whether they own or rent. Thank you.
    Chairman Brown. Thank you, Senator Toomey.
    I will now introduce the five witnesses.
    Professor Matthew Desmond is the Maurice During Professor 
of Sociology at Princeton and the author of the book Evicted. 
He is also Director of the Eviction Lab at Princeton. Mr. 
Desmond, welcome.
    Ms. Laura Brunner is President and Chief Executive Officer 
of the Port of Greater Cincinnati Development Authority in 
Hamilton County, Ohio. Prior to joining the Port in 2011, Ms. 
Brunner spent 15 years in accounting. Ms. Brunner, welcome.
    Ms. Rosanna Morey is a small property owner living in 
Seaford, New York. She is joining us, I believe, from either 
her home or her office in New York. Welcome, Ms. Morey.
    Mr. Darion Dunn is the Managing Partner at Atlantica 
Properties, a real estate investment and asset management 
company in the State of two of our Members of this Committee, 
Senator Ossoff and Senator Warnock. Mr. Dunn is also a civil 
engineer, I understand.
    And Ms. Diane Yentel is the President and CEO of the 
National Low Income Housing Coalition. She was once Vice 
President of Public Policy and Government Affairs at Enterprise 
Community Partners. She has served as Director of Public 
Housing, Management, and Occupancy Division at HUD in 
Washington, and she is almost a regular in this Committee. Ms. 
Yentel, welcome. Professor Desmond, if you would begin. Thank 
you.

 STATEMENT OF MATTHEW DESMOND, MAURICE P. DURING PROFESSOR OF 
     SOCIOLOGY AND DIRECTOR OF THE EVICTION LAB, PRINCETON 
                           UNIVERSITY

    Mr. Desmond. Chairman Brown, Ranking Member Toomey, and 
Members of the Committee, thank you for the opportunity to 
testify before you this morning.
    My name is Matthew Desmond. I am a Professor of Sociology 
at Princeton University, where I direct the Eviction Lab, which 
is a research group dedicated to understanding the causes and 
consequences of housing instability.
    I come before you today gravely concerned about millions of 
American families brutalized by our country's painful and 
utterly predictable rental housing crisis. Since 1985, rent 
prices have exceeded income gains by 325 percent. Most poor 
renting families today spend at least half of their income on 
housing costs, with 1 in 4 spending over 70 percent of their 
income on shelter costs alone.
    Last year, rents increased faster than they ever have on 
record. Nationwide, median asking rent increased by 17 percent 
in a single year, but some cities saw rent increases double 
that. Since last March, rents have risen 30 percent in Orlando, 
29 percent in Cincinnati, 22 percent in Dallas. This is the 
inflation crisis on steroids.
    When the price of gas goes up we can adjust, carpooling to 
work. When the price of food goes up we can adjust, eating out 
less. But when the cost of housing shoots up, what can families 
do? They often are already living in the cheapest apartments 
available. They cannot double-up with relatives because of 
local occupancy laws. They cannot move if they want to keep 
their jobs and family ties and the schools. So all they can do 
is cut back on other necessities like health care and 
educational enrichments and food.
    As a direct result of the housing crisis, the United States 
has a much higher eviction rate than other industrialized 
democracies. The number of eviction filings has increased by 21 
percent since 2000, rising to 3.6 million cases filed in an 
average year.
    Eviction is incredibly harmful to families and communities. 
It leads to job loss and homelessness, to depression and 
suicide. Babies born to mothers who experience an eviction 
while pregnant are significantly more likely to have adverse 
birth outcomes, which have been shown to have life-long and 
even multigenerational effects. The evidence is in and the 
evidence is clear. Eviction is not just a condition of poverty. 
It is a cause of poverty.
    Why have rents risen so aggressively? One possibility is 
that property owners' expenses have gone up, and to maintain a 
steady income owners have to pass on rising housing costs to 
tenants in the form of higher rents.
    But this is not what the data show to be happening. Rather, 
in recent years owners of multifamily properties have seen 
their rental revenues increase at a faster rate than their 
expenses. This has been especially true for properties located 
in low-income neighborhoods. The owners of these properties saw 
their rental revenues increase by 47 percent between 2012 and 
2018. Their expenses during that time only increased by 14 
percent.
    Both the private housing market and the Federal Government 
have failed to provide American families with enough affordable 
housing. As a result, property owners have seized the 
opportunity to increase rents, knowing they have a captive 
tenant base.
    We need to increase the supply of affordable housing, but 
families need relief now, not 10 years from now when the doors 
open but today. Congress could provide much-needed relief by 
deepening investments in housing vouchers. I urge this 
Committee to pass the Eviction Crisis Act and the Family 
Stability Opportunity Vouchers Act, two bipartisan-sponsored 
bills that would help stem the bleeding. And you can extend the 
emergency rental assistance, which did so much to prevent an 
eviction spike during the pandemic.
    When we boost incomes for working families, for Government 
programs, or economic growth but do not address rents, income 
gain are often recouped by the housing market. Studies have 
shown that when States raise minimum wages, landlords respond 
by raising the rent. The implication is that investing in 
affordable housing is not only necessary to stabilize families 
and communities, it is also essential because the success of 
all other economic mobility efforts depend on it.
    Now is not the time for inaction, for indecisiveness, or 
for the same old, tired debates about spending. We could pay 
for deeper investments in housing in dozens of ways. Simply 
collecting unpaid Federal income tax from the top 1 percent of 
households would bring in an estimated $175 billion a year. 
What we can no longer do is look renting families in the face, 
families now living in cars and garages and attics and storage 
sheds, in the richest country on the planet, and tell those 
families, ``You know, we would love to help you but we just 
cannot afford it,'' because that is a lie.
    Chairman Brown. Thank you, Professor. Ms. Brunner, welcome.

STATEMENT OF LAURA BRUNNER, PRESIDENT AND CEO, PORT OF GREATER 
                CINCINNATI DEVELOPMENT AUTHORITY

    Ms. Brunner. Chairman Brown, Ranking Member Toomey, Members 
of the Committee, thank you for the opportunity to testify 
today on how renters and communities are impacted by today's 
housing market and how institutional investors are changing the 
landscape of single-family housing in Hamilton County.
    My name is Laura Brunner, President and CEO of the Port of 
Greater Cincinnati Development Authority. The Port is a public, 
quasigovernmental agency focused on mending broken real estate 
to promote job creation, home ownership, and equitable 
development. Our work is guided by the belief that real estate 
should work for everyone. We focus on the acquisition and 
rehabilitation of blighted residential and commercial 
properties to provide housing options across multiple price 
point, resulting in the revitalization of neighborhoods.
    The Port operates the Hamilton County Land Bank, whose 
mission is to return vacant properties back to productive use. 
Since 2012, we have successfully sold more than 1,000 
properties. Since 2015, the Port's residential program has 
created more than 100 new and renovated, market rate and 
affordable homes, investing $24 million to catalyze private 
investment.
    Housing development is not simply a byproduct of economic 
development but rather an engine of economic stability and 
growth. Simply, homes create long-term wealth. Real estate is 
one of the fastest ways to shrink the wealth gap and to help 
restore the middle class. In Cincinnati, Black home ownership 
is only 33 percent. Nationally, about 42 percent of Black 
households own their home, compared to 72 percent of White 
households.
    Housing and home ownership are the foundation of everything 
else in our lives, and for too long redlining and segregation 
has stifled Black residents from this opportunity. This has 
become increasingly hard today as institutional investors 
continue to crowd out the housing market across the country.
    Last summer, we asked the city of Cincinnati for the names 
of the five worst landlords. It took months of rigorous 
research to uncover that over 4,000 single-family homes in 
Hamilton County had been purchased by these 5 landlords. 
Tracking the acquisitions was an arduous task due to the high 
volume of LLCs used. There is a theme out there: out-of-town 
investors hiding behind a cloak of anonymity.
    As evidence by the city of Cincinnati's lawsuit against 
VineBrook last year, this type of investor model results in 
poorly maintained properties and negligent landlord practices. 
Investor-landlords are also more likely to evict their clients, 
their tenants. Institutional investors may only own 1 percent 
of single-family homes but this may mean 50 percent of homes on 
a single street. When the geographical impact is so 
concentrated it has a negative, game-changing effect on what it 
means to live in a neighborhood. It has an impact on 
neighboring homes where surrounding property values see 
downward pressure.
    Institutional investors found a very profitable new sector. 
They have been purchasing large volumes of single-family homes 
in the region's disinvested neighborhoods and turning them into 
rental properties. They make all-cash offers and box out first-
time and low-income buyers. Our low home values and high rental 
rates make our city attractive. It is a cash cow for investors 
but a money pit for renters. In the second quarter of 2021, 1 
in 6 home sales were purchased by large investors, and we know 
that it is significantly higher at price points below $250,000.
    Just last month, Cincinnati had the largest jump in rental 
prices in the country, so we feel we had to do something to 
insulate renters. In December 2021, the Port placed a bid on 
194 single-family homes formerly owned by a California-based 
firm that fell into receivership. The receiver reached out to 
the Port when the auction of the properties was imminent. We 
could not help but see this opportunity as a partial antidote 
to the threat. In January 2022, the Port closed on this 
acquisition and launched the CARE Homes Initiative. No other 
institution, to our knowledge, has taken on a project similar 
in scope and challenge to this acquisition.
    Because of our risk tolerance, we were able to create an 
innovative financing model that included zero public subsidy. 
The Port leveraged its non-tax revenue to issue bonds to pay 
$14.5 million, outbidding more than a dozen investors. The 
Port's intent with the CARE Homes Initiative is to create 
viable pathways to home ownership for current tenants of these 
homes.
    Working in Neighborhoods, a nonprofit with a successful 
track record, provides assessment, financial literacy training, 
and homebuyer education for all interested tenants as they take 
this step to buy their new homes.
    Of course, bold ideas rarely come without risk. It is clear 
that some of these homes have not been touched or upgraded 
since they were built in the 1950s. Balancing the financial 
performance needs of the homes with the human needs of tenants 
is challenging. This reality reinforces the significance of the 
Port's efforts to interrupt the cycle of predatory investor 
ownership of these properties.
    It is our duty to make real estate work for our community, 
particularly our most vulnerable residents. Now more than ever, 
bold policies and leaders are needed to ensure that housing 
markets meet the needs of our communities.
    Thank you for the opportunity to testify.
    Chairman Brown. Thank you, Ms. Brunner. Ms. Morey, you are 
recognized from New York.

        STATEMENT OF ROSANNA MOREY, SMALL PROPERTY OWNER

    Ms. Morey. Thank you for the invitation to testify today 
and for the opportunity to share my story. My name is Rosanna 
Morey. I live on Long Island in New York, and am a small 
landlord of an owner-occupied home with a rental unit. I am a 
single mom with an incurable cancer that progressed before the 
pandemic began. I rented the apartment in my home on a month-
to-month lease to help with bills and to ease the burden on my 
life. As my health declined I saw no other option but to speak 
to the tenant and provide notice for her to vacate so that my 
sister could stay with me and help me and my teenage son who 
has learning disabilities. The tenant refused, and so began 
holdover filings and proceeding.
    The pandemic hit and the eviction moratorium was put in 
place, which, by the way, was originally intended only for 
nonpayment and COVID-related hardship cases. But somehow all 
cases were lumped together, and did not take long for the 
tenant to stop paying rent. ``Because I effing can, and you can 
thank your Governor for that'' was the response that she gave a 
police officer when he asked why she continued to stay.
    I had to work three jobs while undergoing treatments to 
make ends meet. She spitefully and incessantly smoked, knowing 
that I was sick and that it made me violently ill. She violated 
the lease, which clearly prohibited smoking, because my son was 
asthmatic; she did not care and there was nothing I could do. 
The stress of all of this even contributed to my having a TIA, 
or a mini-stroke.
    I could go on with countless stories of deplorable 
behavior. Thanks to Governor Hochul's and Federal eviction 
moratorium extensions, this tenant was basically given the 
right to abuse the situation. She was allowed to live rent-free 
for 2 years, even though gainfully employed. She ignored any 
and all rules outlined in a binding lease agreement that she 
signed and agreed to, and the situation allowed her to destroy 
my property, knowing that there would be no recourse.
    I was one of the very, very lucky people who received money 
from the Landlord Rental Assistance Program, or LRAP, New 
York's emergency rental assistance program for landlords whose 
tenants were unwilling to apply for Federal emergency rental 
assistance. However, it was only 1 year's rent that I had to 
pay income taxes on, but the tenant was not required to pay 
taxes on the forgiven debt. The money from LRAP did not cover 
the entire back rent, nor the $10,000 in legal fees, nor the 
$25,000 it ended up costing me to rebuild and clean the area 
that she destroyed, even leaving feces everywhere and rotting 
food in the kitchen.
    The overall aftermath and any new regulations that 
landlords would be subjected to will continue to drive them 
away from renting out properties. Policies such as the eviction 
moratorium led to abuse as in my case and many others, and has 
caused a 2-year backlog in court. This has contributed to the 
housing shortage because landlords are still housing nonpaying 
tenants while waiting for their due process. ERAP and LRAP also 
did not really help landlords because a tenant that expects the 
Government to pay will simply not pay their own rent. This 
perpetuates a ``who cares'' attitude and impacts landlords' 
livelihoods, and worse yet, permanently creates an emergency 
rental assistance program that just makes it easier for 
Government officials to re-impose an eviction moratorium or 
lockdown orders, something we can all agree is bad.
    The eviction moratorium that occurred during COVID led to 
Government interference beyond what should have ever been 
allowed. The Government should not discourage landlord 
participation, as that will just drive them away and make 
housing more expensive for all.
    With too many restrictions, affordable housing providers 
like myself will reconsider renting going forward. Some will 
just sell and leave, some will put more stringent requirements 
and tenant screening criteria in place, and some will just 
raise the rents to cover themselves ``just in case.'' We are 
already starting to see the impact of all of this as social 
media videos have begun to circulate teaching prospective 
tenants how to create fake W2s and bank statements, et cetera, 
because so many chose not to pay rent that now they cannot 
provide the documentation required for a new apartment, and 
this cannot continue.
    Landlords are not in the business of evicting, but we 
should be able to in certain circumstances.
    Today, I am asking policymakers to consider landlords, 
particularly small mom-and-pop landlords, and single parent 
landlords trying to make ends meet, and sick landlords like 
myself just trying to get by, because after all, we have 
families to support too.
    Thank you, and I look forward to answering your questions.
    Chairman Brown. Thank you, Ms. Morey. The next witness is 
Mr. Dunn. Welcome.

     STATEMENT OF DARION DUNN, MANAGING PARTNER, ATLANTICA 
                           PROPERTIES

    Mr. Dunn. Thank you. Chairman Brown, Ranking Member Toomey, 
and Members of the Committee, good morning. Thank you for the 
invitation to testify today and share my story.
    My name is Darion Dunn. I am the Managing Partner of 
Atlantica Properties, a company that I started with my younger 
brother and business partner, Trenton Dunn. Atlantica 
Properties is a real estate investment and development firm 
with a mission to empower individuals by establishing thriving, 
holistic communities. I was born and raised in Atlanta, 
Georgia, by parents who taught me that ``home'' is more than a 
place. It is an ideal. I graduated from Georgia Tech where I 
studied civil engineering and economics.
    I have dedicated my life's work to creating and preserving 
affordable housing. After acquiring my first rental property 
over 20 years ago, I have since participated in the ownership, 
management, and development of nearly 1,000 housing units. I 
know that expanding affordable housing in our Nation is 
possible and critical to solving our housing affordability 
challenges, but the Government, at all levels, must empower, 
not restrict, housing providers from doing what they do best, 
providing places to call home for our residents at all income 
levels.
    My company is able to offer affordable rents in part 
because we have a thoughtful, long-term approach to property 
ownership. We have owned many of our rental properties for over 
a decade, while nearby properties have traded hands upwards of 
five times in the same period.
    I am fortunate to have built a successful real estate 
company that operates on an institutional level, yet I have 
never forgotten my humble beginnings as a landlord with very 
limited resources. I saved money from my day jobs for the 
downpayment for single-family rental homes and apartment 
properties. It is not surprising that the majority of rental 
homes and small multifamily properties in this country are 
owned by individuals and small businesses like mine. In fact, 
over 70 percent of tenants in the United States live in 
properties that have 20 units or less, including single-family 
homes.
    Small landlords represent a majority of the rental property 
industry, but policymakers tend to overlook the contributions 
and struggles of this group of business owners. My 
responsibility to our residents includes keeping my business 
viable so I can continue to serve those that are most 
vulnerable to the ever-worsening affordability crisis, and 
Government should seek to help me do that.
    Our tenants are our partners, and our business cannot exist 
without them. The symbiotic relationship between tenants and 
landlords was put on full display during the height of the 
COVID pandemic. The financial pain felt by tenants was 
ultimately felt by landlords, and vice versa. Fortunately, my 
company did not have a large percentage of delinquent tenants 
during the pandemic like many others in my industry. However, 
we did have tenants who were unable or unwilling to pay rent 
for extended periods of time, with the worst case being a 
current tenant that has not paid rent since October 2020.
    While we have fortunately been able to withstand these 
challenges, the majority of small landlords cannot sustain 
these types of setbacks. Emergency rental assistance programs 
have been a welcomed safety net, although many housing 
providers have experienced significant delays in receiving 
these funds, due to challenges with local execution of the 
program.
    Despite Federal resources to help during the pandemic, the 
inventory of affordable housing is eroding as small landlords 
opt to or are forced to sell their properties. With supply 
already outstripped by demand, we cannot afford to lose these 
market players.
    We need more mission-driven housing providers. So, I 
support business practices and public policies that strengthen 
the tenant-landlord bond, as opposed to those measures that pit 
one side against the other. Examples of good measures include 
lease insurance to cover property damage and lost revenue, 
reform of the Section 8 program, incentives to encourage 
housing preservation and conversion of unused commercial 
property to housing, and access to favorable debt and equity 
for non-LIHTC deals.
    Evictions are a last resort, but we must ensure that 
moratoriums do not discourage vulnerable populations from 
paying their rent and building their credit. For example, our 
company doubled down on tenant financial literacy training 
during the pandemic. We educated tenants on the importance of 
avoiding eviction filings and creditor collections. We also 
implemented a program to report positive rent payments to the 
credit bureaus, which has led to 75 percent of our tenants 
improving their credit scores.
    I will close by reiterating that we must increase housing 
supply and provide incentives to strengthen the tenant-landlord 
relationship. There is still time to restore the legacy of 
affordable housing in America, and I promise to continue my 
efforts to make the ideal of ``home'' a reality for generations 
to come.
    Thank you for the opportunity to be here today. I look 
forward to answering any questions.
    Chairman Brown. Thank you, Mr. Dunn.
    Ms. Yentel, welcome. You are recognized for 5 minutes.

  STATEMENT OF DIANE YENTEL, PRESIDENT AND CEO, NATIONAL LOW 
                    INCOME HOUSING COALITION

    Ms. Yentel. Thank you. Chairman Brown, Ranking Member 
Toomey, Members of the Committee, thank you for the opportunity 
to testify today.
    Prepandemic, millions of extremely low-income households, 
disproportionately people of color, struggled to remain housed, 
and more than half-a-million people experienced homelessness. 
Ten million of the lowest-income households paid at least half 
of their limited income on rent, leaving them without resources 
to put food on the table, purchase needed medications, or 
otherwise make ends meet. Any financial shock would cause them 
to fall behind on rent and face eviction, and in the worst 
cases, become homeless. These same households lost wages, had 
increased costs, and were at risk of losing their homes during 
the pandemic.
    The Federal Government responded to the clear and growing 
need by providing unprecedented resources and protections. 
Congress provided $46 billion in emergency rental assistance. 
President Trump implemented a national eviction moratorium, 
which was extended by a bipartisan Congress and further 
extended by President Biden. These resources and protections 
kept millions of renters, who otherwise would have lost their 
homes during a global pandemic, stably housed.
    Now, as resources are depleted and protections expire, low-
income renters are faced with rising inflation, skyrocketing 
rents, eviction filing rates that are reaching or surpassing 
prepandemic averages, and in many communities, increasing 
homelessness. Every $100 increase in median monthly rent is 
associated with a 9 percent increase in homelessness. Last 
year, monthly rents increased, on average nationally, by nearly 
$200.
    Rising rents are driven by increased demand, limited 
supply, and a mostly unregulated market that allows landlords 
to raise rents without regard to the impact on tenants. 
Institutional investors are purchasing homes at an increasing 
rate and they are raising rents, charging higher fees as a 
profit-making strategy, and filing for eviction at alarming 
rates. A lack of national renter protections places tenants at 
risk of unjust treatment, housing instability, and evictions.
    Underlying all these challenges is a longstanding, 
pervasive, and severe shortage of 7 million homes, affordable 
and available to the lowest-income people, which the private 
market, on its own, cannot adequately address. The shortage is 
a structural feature of the country's housing system, impacting 
every State and nearly every community. Yet, Congress only 
funds housing assistance for 1 in 4 eligible households and has 
failed to preserve our country's limited supply of public and 
other deeply affordable housing.
    To address a decades-long housing crisis that has only 
worsened during COVID-19, Congress must enact long-term 
solutions, such as expanding rental assistance for all eligible 
households in need, preserving and expanding the supply of 
deeply affordable homes, providing short-term assistance to 
prevent evictions and homelessness, strengthening and enforcing 
renter protections, and incentivizing or requiring local 
governments to eliminate restrictive local zoning.
    These solutions must be paired with reforms to break down 
barriers that prevent access to critical resources and that 
deepen racial disparities. Although the best opportunity to 
advance long-term solutions is the reconciliation bill moving 
through the Senate now, it looks unlikely that the bill will 
address the housing crisis in any meaningful way, leaving 
renters and people experiencing homelessness to suffer from 
continued inaction.
    So, as champions like Chairman Brown and others on the 
Committee continue working toward long-term solutions in 
Congress, the Biden administration must take immediate action 
to protect tenants from exorbitant rent hikes and prevent more 
homelessness.
    The bottom line is this: the country's lowest-income 
seniors, people with disabilities, and working families are 
struggling to stay housed in this housing market. Without 
decisive and quick action by the Biden administration and 
Congress, too many more renters will fall into homelessness, 
with all its associated costs to children, families, 
communities, and the country. We can prevent this outcome but 
only if we act and act soon.
    Thank you again for the opportunity.
    Chairman Brown. Thank you, Ms. Yentel.
    Ms. Brunner, your story of the CARE Homes Initiative, it is 
quite a story. Thank you for sharing that. I mean, just the 
arduousness, the difficulty of making that happen, thank you 
for your commitment to do that.
    But talk for a moment, if you would, what other areas in 
Ohio are seeing similar--I do not expect you to know the 
details that you know in Cincinnati, of course, but are seeing 
big investors come in, and more importantly, what would help 
the Port and other organizations like it be able to fix up more 
homes and keep them affordable for renters, or return them to 
affordable home ownership? Talk that through, if you would.
    Ms. Brunner. Thank you for the question, Mr. Chairman. We 
became aware of this issue about a year ago when there was an 
article in the Wall Street Journal that featured Cleveland, 
Ohio, and the rapid increase of ownership by these 
institutional investors there, and that is what made us start 
to study what was happening here in Cincinnati.
    I think Ohio, in general, is typical of a target area 
because of our home values relative to the rental market. So I 
do not have any specific information but I know this is 
something that is happening throughout Ohio.
    Yes, the LLCs, when we got the names of five different 
investors that had the most significant code violations from 
the city of Cincinnati, and then went to figure out how many 
homes they owned in our country, you cannot look up the entity 
name because it is common in real estate that LLCs are used for 
real estate ownership. But we did find that one particular 
investor had 91 LLCs just in our county.
    So that means there is this lack of transparency, which 
makes accountability harder, and that is one of the changes 
that we would recommend is that there is some kind of 
registration process that would make it easier for the local 
jurisdictions to then track and hold accountable these property 
owners for the condition of the properties.
    And we also discovered that many of them are still 
receiving home ownership credits on their property tax bills, 
so that is something else that should be changed. And we 
certainly do not want to have less costs for them than other 
businesses, because what they are doing is, you know, these are 
businesses so they should pay higher taxes.
    And I also think that, you know, we are looking into two 
other ideas. We do not know the extent to which Opportunity 
Zone funding has been used for the investment in these 
properties. We know that a very significant amount of 
investment is in low census tract areas. So it would be a 
concern, certainly, if Opportunity Zone funding is used for 
this, which is, I think, not the intent. And I think there 
needs to be some analysis of REET taxation and the implications 
that it has for this asset class.
    Chairman Brown. Thanks, Ms. Brunner.
    Professor Desmond, two questions, if you would kind of 
answer them together. First addressing what Ms. Brunner said 
about LLCs. Tell us how it has affected your ability to track 
who is filing evictions around the country, because I know that 
is a big part of the work you are doing at the Eviction Lab. 
And then if you would also speak for a moment about the 
Eviction Crisis Act, how it would help us better understand and 
prevent evictions.
    Mr. Desmond. Thank you, Chairman Brown. The growth of LLCs 
in the rental housing market has expanded precipitously over 
the years. Studies have linked LLC ownership to property 
neglect. This is not because landowners who register under LLCs 
own older stocks. It seems to be LLCs invite moral hazard. What 
prevents liability also seems to prevent accountability and can 
invite negligent behaviors. Studies have also linked LLC 
ownership to property disinvestment, tax abandonment, even 
completely walking away from properties.
    One of the landlords I spent time with in Milwaukee, I 
asked her, ``What happened to this house that I spent a lot of 
time with?'' and she said, ``I just gave it back to the city.'' 
And what she meant was she just stopped paying taxes on it and 
let it go into tax foreclosure. Tax foreclosure should not be 
part of the business strategy, but for some landlords that use 
LLCs it is.
    It is also the case that it seems to be the case that a 
small number of landlords do an outsized number of evicting. 
Now we cannot know who exactly those people are because we do 
not know who owns our cities. If we did, we could design 
policies that would target the root of the eviction crisis.
    The Eviction Crisis Act would do a lot to get us to a 
better place when it comes to stemming evictions. First, it 
would allow us to track eviction data, which is the only way to 
understand if evictions are, for example, violating the Fair 
Housing Act. The Federal Government does not collect eviction 
data. The only group that does is my group, at Princeton, on a 
national level, and I promise you I will not do this forever.
    The second thing the Eviction Crisis Act does is look at 
legal reform and inside the courts, and see if we can make a 
more humane and rational way to adjudicate the process.
    And third, it looks at rental assistance, and if we could 
figure out a way to make small dollars go a long way. For 
example, in Cincinnati last year, I believe 1 in 7 evictions 
were for less than $500. So for some cases, the line between 
homelessness and staying in your home does not cost that much 
money.
    Chairman Brown. Thank you. Ms. Yentel, your comments on 
that, what the Eviction Crisis Act would do, in your view.
    Ms. Yentel. Sure, I would point primarily to the last piece 
that Matt mentioned--making emergency rental assistance a 
permanent program and permanently funding it at $3 billion 
annually. The legislation was initially introduced as 
bipartisan legislation in the Senate in 2019. Even before the 
pandemic, there was bipartisan understanding and agreement that 
short-term rental assistance could help some families who can 
otherwise make ends meet absorb an unexpected financial shock 
and avoid eviction and the spiraling into poverty that results.
    It was initially envisioned as a pilot program. And then, 
of course, 2020 came--the pandemic and $46 billion in emergency 
rental assistance. We have had our pilot program. Emergency 
rental assistance has been successful. Forty billion of the $46 
billion has been spent or obligated. Six million families have 
been helped. Over six million payments have been made.
    So, now it is time to take all the lessons that we learned 
during the pandemic, from the 500 programs that were stood up 
across the country, and put that into authorization and funding 
for a permanent emergency rental assistance program. And again, 
I am really pleased to see that the legislation is bipartisan 
and does have bipartisan support.
    Chairman Brown. Thank you. Senator Toomey.
    Senator Toomey. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Ms. Morey, thank you for being with us remotely today. I 
appreciate your testimony. I feel badly for the circumstances 
you are in. I certainly hope your prognosis is good and that 
you are feeling well.
    You know, I read your testimony so I know the story, but we 
did not have a good audio connection for much of your opening 
comments. So I just want to clarify a few things for people who 
might not have been able to understand what you were saying.
    First of all, my understanding is you own your own home and 
attached, or as part of that home, there is an apartment, and 
that you rented that apartment out on a month-to-month lease to 
a tenant. Right?
    Ms. Morey. That is correct.
    Senator Toomey. Right. And then at some point, because of a 
deterioration in your health, you decided that you really 
needed to have your sister move into that apartment who could 
help you. And so you provided the notice to your tenant that 
you, at some point, would not continue to renew the lease, and 
your tenant, nevertheless, refused to leave the apartment. Is 
that right?
    Ms. Morey. That is correct.
    Senator Toomey. Did I understand you to say that she stayed 
in the apartment without paying at least the full rent--I do 
not know if she paid any rent--for 2 years?
    Ms. Morey. Close to.
    Senator Toomey. Close to 2 years she stayed in the 
apartment. And you could not do anything about that. Why?
    Ms. Morey. Because housing courts were closed, and even 
when I tried to open a different case because of her smoking--
so more of an emergency type of hearing or filing, that was 
going to start the clock over again, meaning that my last 
filing would go away and the new filing would then take its 
place.
    Senator Toomey. And with an eviction moratorium in place 
would you be able to evict this person?
    Ms. Morey. Yes, if there was no eviction moratorium in 
place, if I heard you correctly, yes.
    Senator Toomey. Right. If there was no eviction moratorium 
then you could. If there is an eviction moratorium then you 
would not.
    Did this person seem to know that you were not in a 
position to be able to evict her?
    Ms. Morey. Yes.
    Senator Toomey. And so took advantage of that.
    And so let me ask you. Having gone through this experience 
and knowing what you know about the Government's willingness, 
certainly at times, to impose a ban on evictions, do you regret 
having rented your place out?
    Ms. Morey. I do not regret it, but a guarantee of no 
moratorium, there would have to be more than that. I would have 
to feel supported and protected by my Government. There would 
have to be protections for risk mitigations [inaudible] in 
order for me to ever consider renting again.
    Senator Toomey. Right. You know, we have been hearing a lot 
about the supply of housing. That is true. We have a shortage, 
and this is, to me, a very compelling story of the unintended 
consequence of what is meant to be helpful to tenants but 
actually becomes very harmful when some people inevitably abuse 
this.
    Mr. Dunn, in your testimony you said, and I quote, 
``Government actions that raise my costs ultimately impact my 
residents and my ability to provide affordable housing,'' end 
quote. So I assume that like any other business if there are 
higher costs imposed on you from the outside, at some point you 
have got to pass that on to your customers, the renters, 
whether it is in higher rent or a higher security deposit, or 
some combination thereof.
    If higher costs are imposed on you, are you going to have 
to impose those costs ultimately on renters?
    Mr. Dunn. Generally that is the case. There is a 
misconception that landlords are mostly big business, and as we 
have heard today that over 70 percent of landlords are small 
businesses.
    Senator Toomey. Yeah, and I do want to get to a point about 
that.
    Mr. Dunn. And also those costs have to be passed on because 
there are such relatively small margins, like in any business. 
I mean, some businesses have less than 10 percent of a cash-
flow margin and up to maybe 20 or 30 percent. So if costs are 
raised by even 10 or 20 percent, that could absolutely wipe out 
any profit.
    Senator Toomey. Right. So it has to get passed on.
    So a cost such as, I do not know, you know, higher tax or a 
higher maintenance cost on your building, is an obvious one. 
But there is another kind of cost which would be if the 
Government imposes an eviction moratorium that has the effect 
that some percentage of rent is not going to be collected 
because people know that you have no recourse if they do not 
pay the rent.
    So most people will still continue to pay their rent on 
time because they know it is the right thing to do, and they 
will. But there will be some percentage that will choose not 
to. And so knowing that, if you are living under an eviction 
moratorium where the Government is imposing that cost in the 
form of lost revenue, do not most landlords have to pass that 
on in the form of a higher rent to people who are paying their 
rent?
    Mr. Dunn. The moratoriums can create--it can threaten the 
relationship between tenants and landlords. Most tenants, as 
you said, they pay their rent. They are responsible. But when 
you have a system that does not protect the other side of the 
partnership--and you often hear me use that word, 
``partnership''--it is not about the tenant, it is not about 
the landlord. It is about the tenant-landlord partnership. And 
when one side of that partnership is not protected it hurts the 
entire system.
    So when you have a moratorium in place that does not allow 
one side of the partnership to thrive, that entire system 
breaks down.
    Senator Toomey. And the cost is going to have to be borne 
by people who are paying.
    The last point I want to make, it has come up repeatedly 
from witnesses, and my colleagues have made the point about 
increasing percentage of single-family homes, especially that 
are owned by private investors. And there are a lot of people 
that are very concerned about that.
    I would just underscore that the people who are most able 
to afford the burden, the costs, over ever more regulations are 
large corporations that can spread that out in a big legal 
department as opposed to the mom-and-pop tenant.
    And, by the way, we tolerate the GSEs subsidizing the 
financing of private investors in these single-family homes. If 
people would prefer to have local landlords and people owning 
their own homes, one thing we could do is forbid the GSEs from 
engaging in these subsidies. I would urge my Democratic 
colleagues to consider that.
    Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Chairman Brown. Thank you, Senator Toomey.
    Senator Menendez, of New Jersey, is recognized.
    Senator Menendez. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Ms. Yentel, the National Low Income Housing Coalition's Out 
of Reach report shows in stark detail just how hard it is for 
low-income renters to afford even modest housing. In my home 
State of New Jersey, a medium-income renter is barely able to 
pay for a one-bedroom home. A renter earning minimum wage would 
need to work 80 hours a week, or two full-time jobs, to afford 
a one-bedroom house.
    However, the data is actually even worse than that because 
affordable housing availability impacts other parts of a 
family's budget. For example, affordable housing is 
increasingly located in areas that are far away from job 
centers, forcing workers to pay higher transportation costs.
    Given this, how important is it that we build more 
affordable housing near public transit so that we can connect 
people to good-paying jobs and careers and opportunities?
    Ms. Yentel. Thank you for the question, Senator Menendez. 
It is important that Congress not only invest in more deeply 
affordable homes for the lowest-income people but also ensure 
that low-income, extremely low-income people, and people of 
color can live near transportation and the opportunities that 
that presents for them.
    We also have to be careful when we work on transit-oriented 
development to ensure that it does not create displacement or 
gentrification. And the affordable housing component of TOD is 
the best way to do that--to ensure that we are preserving 
existing affordable housing in neighborhoods connected to 
transportation and building more so that the lowest-income 
people are not displaced if new development comes near those 
transit stations.
    Senator Menendez. Thank you. That is why I led the charge 
on my Livable Communities Act, which creates a Federal grant 
program to incentivize the development of new affordable 
housing near existing mass transit. And, you know, we hope to 
see some of that happen.
    By the way, my preface to the question, you do not dispute 
any of what I said in terms of the realities of where it is for 
rental incomes in terms of people's challenge to meet that?
    Ms. Yentel. Absolutely. Rents are far out of reach, 
certainly for minimum wage workers, other low-wage workers, and 
for seniors, and people with disabilities on extremely limited 
fixed incomes. But we also find that rents are far out of reach 
even for the average renter, who often earns about $5 to $6 
less an hour than what rent costs in their communities.
    So, a big part of the housing crisis that we are facing 
today is stagnant or declining wages for the lowest-income 
people and skyrocketing rents that they cannot afford.
    Senator Menendez. And when people cannot find a place to 
call home and they are displaced then society bears the burden. 
Talk about who bears the burden.
    Ms. Yentel. Oh, absolutely. Inaction is expensive. You 
know, as a country, we pay to allow for homelessness and 
housing poverty to persist. And we pay for it through increased 
health care costs for families and parents; we pay for it 
through lessened educational attainment for kids. Families that 
are unstably housed or precariously housed earn less over their 
lifetimes. They pay less in taxes.
    So, the flip of that is also true. When we invest in 
affordable housing there are savings to be found in many other 
areas of our life and throughout the Federal Government.
    Senator Menendez. Thank you. Professor Desmond, the 
coronavirus brought unprecedented challenges to all of us, 
including renters across America, many who were already 
struggling prior to the pandemic. However, with the CARES Act 
eviction moratorium and the emergency rental assistance funding 
provided by the Consolidated Appropriations Act and the 
American Rescue Plan we were able to keep millions of people 
from being evicted.
    What has the Eviction Lab's data shown about how these 
programs help renters stay in their homes?
    Mr. Desmond. Both programs are historic and incredibly 
successful. Between the end of the CDC's eviction moratorium 
and July, roughly 216,000 evictions that would be expected 
under normal conditions did not happen. The biggest reductions 
in evictions were seen in low-income African American and 
Hispanic communities, areas mostly affected by the eviction 
crisis. At the same time, during the days that the moratorium 
existed, foreclosures were down historically in the country too 
because the Federal Government also rolled out forbearance for 
homeowners.
    And so this was a policy that was one of the most important 
Federal policies in the lives of low-income renters since the 
invention of public housing.
    Senator Menendez. And finally, what lessons can we learn 
from the pandemic with regard to targeted housing assistance 
programs to the communities that need it most to ensure funding 
is deployed as rapidly and efficiently as possible?
    Mr. Desmond. One of the consequences of the emergency 
rental assistance program is the development of channels in 
every State to get money in the hands of tenants that need it 
and a way to make property owners whole. It would be a waste to 
let those channels go by the wayside since we have built them 
through the pandemic.
    Senator Menendez. Thank you. I understand Senator Cramer is 
next.
    Senator Cramer. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and Ranking Member. 
Thanks to all of our witnesses for being here.
    Mr. Dunn, it seems we pretty much can all agree, to some 
degree, on the problem. I will tell you, in listening to 
Senator Toomey's questioning, my mind started going down the 
usual path of what is the ultimate end to the constant 
Government distortion of markets, the sticks and the carrots 
that seem to just create a higher price and very little in 
regard to providing more supply? I mean, the biggest problem 
with inflation, the cause of inflation, is when demand outpaces 
supply. So we keep incenting demand and do not do enough, in my 
view, to incentivize supply. And I am not really sure where it 
all ends.
    But one part of that scenario that we do not talk about 
enough is the cost of regulation. And there has been a study 
that I am sure you are familiar with, recently that predicts 
about 40 percent of the cost of multifamily and single-family 
rent is regulation.
    Can you speak a little bit to Government regulation, and 
again, I am sincere when I say I think we struggle to find the 
balance. Every time we try to solve a problem we incentivize 
one side or the other and all we do is escalate costs. Can you 
speak a little bit to that imbalance, and what is the right 
balance, if you have a sense of what that might be?
    Mr. Dunn. Yes, Senator Cramer, and you are correct. The 
National Homebuilders Association, they did do a study in 
looking at all levels of Government regulation adds about 40 
percent to the cost of building homes and to the cost of 
building real estate and developing real estate, and that is 
directly passed on to the very people we are trying to help.
    So we have to make sure that we are dealing with the root 
cause of the issue, which is a lack of supply, and everyone, 
even every witness here today, we agree that that is the 
problem. And we need to focus our efforts and focus our dollars 
on every level of the Government--local, State, and Federal 
level--on making sure we are creating more housing.
    And when we create solutions that, in many cases I even 
understand why they are being created, in the short term, to 
help one side, it does not help the problem and it does not 
solve the problem that we need more housing. We have to make 
sure there are plans that create more units and not initiatives 
that pit one side against the other. We have to make sure that 
tenant-landlord bond, which is sacred, has a place to live in 
this country.
    Senator Cramer. And you do not advocate, and I do not think 
any of us advocate no regulations. Obviously there needs to be 
protections put in place. But I agree. Honestly, the problem is 
easier to identify than the solution, I readily admit. When the 
incentives create a distortion to the point where the cost of 
rent is going up faster than the rest of the economy, that is 
not the right solution.
    But I am kind of with you. I would like to see us focus 
more on the supply side, but I am not sure that completely does 
it either because sometimes you can end up with just an 
overabundance of that as well.
    Anyway, with that thank you all. And, by the way, I still 
have a minute and a half. If anybody else wants to comment on 
the same question, either from a different perspective, I would 
be happy to listen.
    Ms. Yentel. Well, I would be happy to share that related to 
regulations or State and local laws, one of the biggest 
challenges to increasing affordable housing supply is often 
restrictive local zoning that inhibits the supply of any kind 
of apartments, and especially affordable apartments. And this 
drives up costs for everybody and it exacerbates segregation 
and other racial disparities.
    So, States and localities will need to do more to limit or 
entirely remove those restrictive zoning laws if we are to be 
able to build the number of homes that the country needs.
    And the Federal Government can use the levers that it has, 
primarily by creating incentives or requirements that are tied 
to Federal funding, especially the big pots of funding through 
the bipartisan transportation infrastructure bill. That can 
create a very compelling incentive for local communities if 
they are able to receive those funds only if they do more at 
the local level to reduce restrictive zoning.
    Senator Cramer. The only thing that concerns me about that 
is that--that sounds swell until the local community decides it 
is not worth the funding, in which case you have solved no 
problem.
    Ms. Yentel. Well, that is why we should think bigger than 
the housing funds, where typically we do look at incentives for 
restrictive zoning, and we should look to the much bigger pots 
of money that all communities want, related to transportation 
funds, highways, et cetera.
    Senator Cramer. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Chairman Brown. Thank you, Senator Cramer.
    Senator Reed, from Rhode Island, is recognized.
    Senator Reed. Well thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. 
Professor Desmond, what we have noticed is that a lot of 
institutional investors, private equity firms, et cetera, have 
been getting into buying residential homes in significant 
numbers, and that could disrupt the entire market. I know real 
estate is typically a really local issue in terms of realtors, 
in terms of individual sales, in terms of all those factors.
    Do you have an assessment yet as to why they are getting 
in, what they might do, and where are the downsides?
    Mr. Desmond. Thank you, Senator Reed. So we have seen the 
rise of institutional investors in the single-family rental 
market after the 2008 foreclosure crisis, because there was a 
market opportunity. The average cost of a home dropped by 27 
percent after the foreclosure but rents did not decrease during 
the last recession. That gave institutional investors a chance 
to buy up single-family homes below market rent and rent them 
at market rents. And that is why you have seen increasing 
investment in sunbelt cities, like Atlanta, Charlotte, Phoenix, 
for example, where institutional investors have the bigger 
chunk of the market.
    Nationwide, it seems about 2.3 percent of the single-family 
rental market is now owned by institutional investors, but even 
that relatively small footprint is much bigger in places like 
Atlanta, where in some neighborhoods a third of the single-
family market is owned by institutional investors.
    Why should this concern us? Because research has linked 
institutional investment to higher housing costs, as 
institutional investors raise rents much more aggressively than 
smalltime landlords. There is also research linking 
institutional investors to property neglect, putting more onus 
on tenants for upkeep, and also they evict at much higher rates 
for much lower amounts of money.
    Senator Reed. Thank you very much. And the other issue, 
recalling my service here in '08, '09, and '10, is that are we 
seeing these institutional investors taking the ownership and 
then creating derivatives or other financial products based on 
their ownership? Is that happening?
    Mr. Desmond. I am not sure how to answer that question at 
this time.
    Senator Reed. OK. Very good.
    And both Ms. Yentel and Professor Desmond, what kinds of 
Federal investments in housing supply would be the most 
effective to ease family housing costs and help renters? Any 
thoughts? Professor Desmond and then Ms. Yentel.
    Mr. Desmond. Sure. So the Housing Choice Voucher Program 
has been an incredibly effective program. You know, families, 
when they receive a housing voucher, move to better 
neighborhoods. Their kids do better in schools. Their kids 
literally eat more and become healthier and less anemic.
    So an incredibly cost-effective, successful way to expand 
more housing security, more economic mobility for families 
across the country is simply to take a program that we have, 
that already works really well, and expand it to all the 
families that need it.
    Senator Reed. Ms. Yentel, your comments?
    Ms. Yentel. I absolutely agree and would add that when it 
comes to housing supply our country's newest and most deeply 
targeted housing supply program is the national Housing Trust 
Fund, thanks to your leadership in creating it and getting it 
enacted. The program, at its current funding level, 100 percent 
of those dollars are to build or preserve apartments affordable 
to extremely low-income households. And many of those 
apartments are up and running now, housing some of the most 
marginalized, vulnerable people in our country, including 
people who are previously chronically homeless, kids who are 
aging out of foster care, survivors of domestic violence, and 
so on.
    The only problem with the program is that it is woefully 
underfunded, given the need. This year was its largest funding 
level yet, and it is still at under $1 billion for the entire 
country. So, that program needs to be significantly expanded so 
that we can build the number of homes that are needed and 
ensure that they are affordable to the people with the greatest 
and the clearest needs, which are extremely low-income renters.
    Senator Reed. This shall come as no surprise but I 
completely agree with you. Our challenge is to come up with the 
funding sources to keep the Housing Trust Fund very, very 
active going forward.
    With that, Mr. Chairman, I will thank you and thank the 
panel. Thank you very much.
    Chairman Brown. Thank you, Senator Reed.
    Senator Tester, from Montana, is recognized from his 
office.
    Senator Tester. Yeah. Thank you, Chairman Brown. Thanks for 
having the hearing.
    Look, I come from Montana, and many Montanans have had 
trouble finding available housing. It is the same way across 
the country. The price points have gotten too high. It has 
gotten worse during the pandemic, because so many people think 
that the entire State is like the show Yellowstone, and I guess 
that is OK but that is really not true.
    And across our communities in Montana, some places are 
seeing median sale prices of a home rise 40 percent in the last 
year alone. This is pushing more and more people from potential 
home ownership to looking for homes to rent.
    So Ms. Brunner, what impact do these challenges have on the 
ground in communities like yours?
    Ms. Brunner. Thank you for the question, Senator. I think 
that there is a profound impact on local families when home 
ownership opportunities are taken away from them, and an 
amazing impact on the neighborhoods that are replaced by 
institutional investors owning the properties.
    And if I can build on the question that was asked earlier 
about the motivations for these investors, one of the things 
that has fueled is what Professor Desmond talking about, and 
obviously with the home prices crashing, going back to the time 
of the 2008 housing crisis, and then there has been, since that 
time, an amazing amount of institutional money and nonrecourse 
debt that has been available.
    So many of these investors have been able to buy properties 
without any guarantees of the debt. And the portfolio that we 
purchased, for example, it was in receivership not because the 
portfolio failed but because the owner just walked away, and 
then the judge put the properties into receivership for the 
protection of the investors and lenders.
    So there has been too much capital out there chasing places 
for investment, and then this product has really been created 
out of whole cloth. Instead of investing in apartment buildings 
and office buildings and industrial buildings, all of a sudden 
single-family houses became the desirable sector. And there has 
been so much money chasing it, and the debt has been too easy 
to get.
    And then as you go back into the individual neighborhoods, 
when you have 4,000 houses in a community the size of Hamilton 
County, in every single neighborhood, it makes a difference. 
And we are getting calls from jurisdictions throughout the 
county on a regular basis, asking what we can do to help them 
fight back.
    Senator Tester. OK. And also in my State a growing number 
of homes for rent are being converted into vacation rentals, in 
many, many communities, which puts additional stress on already 
low housing supply.
    Ms. Yentel, are there strategies that have worked to 
prevent local residents from being displaced or ease the impact 
due to tourism? I know it is a two-edged sword, but quite 
frankly, when these homes are taken off the market because 
families cannot afford to buy them because they are used for 
vacation rentals, that adds to the problem. Are there any 
strategies out there?
    Ms. Yentel. Well, sure. Any time that rental units, and 
especially affordable rental units, are taken off the market 
and used for some other purpose than housing low-income people, 
that exacerbates the existing shortage of homes affordable to 
them in that community.
    So, it points back to the real need to, in places where 
there are not enough homes for the people who live there or 
want to live there, we need to build more. And to build more 
market-rate apartments, we need local communities to remove 
restrictive zoning laws and allow the market to build those 
units and have them affordable to middle- or higher-income 
renters.
    For the lower and especially extremely low-income renters, 
the private market, on its own, cannot build and operate 
apartments that are affordable to them because they cannot pay 
enough in rent to cover the costs to build and operate the 
apartments. So, for them, Federal subsidies are needed--either 
in the form of rental assistance to be a bridge between what 
they can afford and what rent costs, if there are an adequate 
number of homes and the people living in them can afford them, 
or, in the form of building apartments and ensuring that they 
are deeply affordable to extremely low-income people through 
programs like the national Housing Trust Fund.
    Senator Tester. Ms. Yentel, as long as you are warmed up, 
we do not have any immigration policy in this country, quite 
frankly, and we need one, because it would help with workforce, 
it would actually have some positive impacts on reducing 
inflation, but nonetheless, we are locked up on that issue in 
Washington, DC, and we have an incredible paralysis.
    Do you have any thoughts on where we can get workforce to 
build these houses?
    Ms. Yentel. I am sorry. I do not fully understand the 
question.
    Senator Tester. The point is if we are going to increase 
supply we have got to have workforce. We have got no workforce. 
We have got no immigration policy and we do not have enough 
folks to build houses. Do you have any thoughts on that?
    Ms. Yentel. That is a really important and good question. I 
do not have immediate solutions to share, but I would love to 
follow up with your office afterwards to share some.
    Senator Tester. Super. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Chairman Brown. Thank you, Senator Tester.
    Senator Warner, from Virginia, is recognized from his 
office.
    Senator Warner. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate you 
having this hearing, and Ms. Yentel, if you have got those 
solutions on workforce in terms of building housing, let my 
office know as well. We are all overdue on an immigration 
solution. One of the things I know, I have worked with the 
Chairman and others on, is that as we think about a project 
that I have been involved in, unsuccessfully, for well over a 
decade, in terms of Fannie and Freddie reform, the idea of 
having something approximating a 15- to 20-basis-point fee on 
all of the work that Fannie and Freddie does on mortgages would 
create a dedicated source of funding for not only first time 
home ownership but also potentially into the National Housing 
Trust Fund to deal with the rental issue as well.
    One of the things I have worked on a lot has been home 
ownership, and my question, Ms. Yentel, I am going to come to 
you, is on rental housing. I have been a big advocate, along 
with others on this Committee, on Community Development 
Financial Institutions, CDFIs. I am proud of the fact that 
along with Senator Crapo and a number of Members on this 
Committee we have started a CDFI Caucus in the Senate to try to 
make sure we get more capital into these entities that help 
fund low- and moderate-income housing. We have seen, through 
COVID, a disproportionate impact on communities of color.
    I think we need to do that, and I think there is this 
virtuous circle, that I know, Ms. Yentel, you talked about as 
well, but providing more affordable housing either in the 
rental market or in terms of even home ownership ends up 
helping communities all across the income spectrum.
    But I am going to go to you, Ms. Yentel, because your group 
did a recent study called ``The Gap: A Shortage of Affordable 
Rental Housing.'' In a State like mine, the Commonwealth of 
Virginia, we have got about 150,000 shortage of affordable 
rental housing units.
    We have got certain tax programs that you, Ms. Yentel, and 
others have pointed out. We just do not have enough private 
capital going into building affordable rental housing.
    What can we do, as the Federal Government, beyond some more 
traditional programs, to incent more private capital going into 
this underserved market?
    Ms. Yentel. Well, I would actually bring it back to the 
public investments that are needed, especially as we talk about 
where the data shows the clearest and the greatest needs are. 
The data are very clear that the most severe shortage of homes 
affordable is for the lowest-income people. In fact, extremely 
low-income renters are the only segment of the population for 
which there is an absolute shortage of homes affordable to 
them. And this has ripple effects up the income ladder, and 
addressing this shortage can provide relief up the income 
ladder too, especially when we are talking about Federal 
resources. I think it is very important that we ensure that 
these limited resources are targeted where the greatest needs 
are.
    The work that you have done on first-generation homebuyers, 
and assisting more first-generation people to become 
homebuyers, I think that is very important, and for renters 
too, because all housing is on a continuum. And when we have a 
situation like we do today, where potential first-generation 
homebuyers are locked out of the markets because single-family 
home prices are so high, that keeps them in the rental market. 
They tend to have higher incomes than other renters. That can 
drive up costs.
    And as I have said before, our housing system is like a 
game of musical chairs. And when the music stops playing, it is 
always the lowest-income people or people with no incomes who 
are left standing, without any homes at all.
    Senator Warner. Can I just ask you--I mean, I understand we 
need this Federal subsidy, but unless we are going to do 100 
Federal financing, how do we take those Federal incentives to 
incent private capital beyond kind of what some of the tax 
credit programs, to actually get us more supply of low-income 
rental housing? I mean, I an just wondering if there is 
anything else. Should we simply fund the existing tax credit 
programs or are there other examples of creative initiatives 
you have seen in your work that we ought to put into the 
toolkit?
    Ms. Yentel. Well, we can do direct grants, as we do through 
the national Housing Trust Fund, and that is effective for 
communities to be able to use those funds to build and preserve 
apartments affordable to the lowest-income people. Tax 
incentives are also helpful in attracting private capital. The 
Low-Income Housing Tax Credit is certainly a very successful 
program that should be expanded and reformed to ensure the 
communities that receive those tax credits can do more, again, 
to build apartments for those lowest-income people.
    Senator Warner. Can I just say, Mr. Chairman, I think we 
all, or most of us on the Committee support that National 
Housing Trust Fund, but the erratic level of funding to that, 
one of the ideas, even though we may not have fully agreed on 
all the housing finance reform, the idea that at least putting 
some dedicated fee on those mortgages that get the Government 
guarantee, that would provide a more stable source of funding 
for the National Housing Trust Fund. I hope we can revisit.
    Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Chairman Brown. Thank you, Senator Warner.
    Senator Warren, from Massachusetts, is recognized.
    Senator Warren. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    America's renters are struggling, and the Fed's interest 
rate hikes are making it both more expensive to build more 
housing and more expensive to take out a mortgage to buy a 
home. This could lock more families into the rental market and 
push rents even higher.
    Now big Wall Street firms are watching this with dollar 
signs in their eyes. Private equity, real estate investment 
trusts, and big corporations have gobbled up more and more of 
the rental market and now serve as landlords to thousands and 
thousands of Americans.
    In 2018, nonindividual investors owned 26 percent of the 
rental stock, up from 18 percent in 2001. On a recent earnings 
call, executive at the private equity firm Blackstone bragged 
that slowing housing construction, that is less supply, and 
higher mortgage costs, quote, ``provide a lot of support,'' end 
quote, for their bottom line since, quote, ``people will still 
have to live somewhere.''
    So Professor Desmond, you are the leading expert on 
predatory housing schemes so let me ask you. As corporate 
landlords like Blackstone buy up rental properties what will be 
the impact on families who are in those homes?
    Mr. Desmond. Senator Warren, first, those families will pay 
more, and sometimes a lot more. Institutional investors are on 
record by raising the rents double digits. Even in the single 
quarter, those families also might experience a reduction in 
housing quality as institutional investors divest from housing 
as part of their business model. They saddle tenants with extra 
fines and fees, including tenants that cannot make the rent at 
the beginning of the month, just because they do not get paid 
on a monthly basis.
    Plus those tenants are often outgunned not only politically 
but in court, where many of those tenants do not have access to 
a lawyer but over 90 percent of landlords do. That leaves those 
families in an incredibly vulnerable situation.
    Senator Warren. Right. You know, in fact, thanks to an 
investigation by the House Select Subcommittee on the 
Coronavirus Crisis, we know that during the height of the 
pandemic corporate landlords illegally evicted families by the 
thousands, violating Federal and State moratoriums that had 
been put in place to protect tenants.
    So today, with families struggling with these rapidly 
rising rents that you talked about, and with the economy at 
risk of being pushed into recession by the Fed's overzealous 
interest rate hikes, it is urgent that we take steps to protect 
renters from predatory schemes and ensure that corporate 
landlords at least follow the rules that are in place.
    And that is one reason I proposed creating a new Tenant 
Protection Bureau, which would allow tenants to easily file 
complaints against unscrupulous landlords and to provide 
officials with the data they need to enforce tenant protection 
laws.
    Ms. Yentel, how could a Tenant Protection Bureau protect 
families' rights and force these Wall Street landlords to 
actually follow the rules?
    Ms. Yentel. It could be tremendously helpful, Senator 
Warren. As you said, that report only verified what we knew was 
happening during the pandemic, which was that some of these 
corporate landlords were flouting the law. And we pushed 
throughout the pandemic for the Federal Government to hold them 
accountable, to apply the penalties to them for not following 
the CDC eviction moratorium. But there was no single agency 
that was charged with or empowered to do that, and so it did 
not happen.
    If we had a Tenant Protection Bureau in place during the 
pandemic, it could have prevented untold harm and evictions of 
some of the most marginalized people. And if we had it today, 
it could help further enforce tenant protections, prevent 
egregious rent hikes, and let tenants hold their landlords 
accountable.
    Senator Warren. That is a very powerful answer and I 
appreciate it.
    Look, to ensure that every family has access to a safe and 
affordable place to live, we have got to build more housing. 
That is the ultimate answer. We need more supply. There is no 
way around it. These investments are overdue.
    But it is also urgent that right now we stand up to big 
corporate landlords and to protect tenants from these predatory 
schemes that could push them out on the street, and a Tenant 
Protection Bureau would be a good start.
    So thank you very much. Thank you for your work. Thank you 
for being here. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Chairman Brown. Thank you, Senator Warren.
    Senator Van Hollen, of Maryland, is recognized.
    Senator Van Hollen. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank all 
of you for your testimony here today.
    And I think there is consensus that we need to address the 
housing supply issue, and there may be some Federal tools we 
can use to incentivize local jurisdictions to reduce barriers 
to housing supply. But I think all of us know we are not going 
to snap our fingers today and in the next 6 months, a year, a 
couple of years, create all of the supply we need.
    So I think we should also be focused on using proven public 
policy tools to provide more families with affordable housing 
and allow families that have been trapped in poverty to move to 
areas of opportunity.
    Professor Desmond, I want to start with you because you 
mentioned in your written testimony a bipartisan bill that I 
introduced with Senator Todd Young called the Family Stability 
and Opportunity Vouchers Act, which would provide families with 
young kids the opportunity to move to an affordable home but 
also wraparound services, to make transitions to other 
neighborhoods with higher opportunity.
    Could you first briefly talk about the fact that people 
have looked at this, the empirical evidence that shows this is 
effective, and second, what is the impact on that program, 
which we are trying to expand significantly because it has been 
successful? What is the impact of some of the institutional 
investors buying up properties in some of the areas these 
families want to move to?
    Mr. Desmond. Thank you for the question, Senator. The 
bipartisan bill that you helped introduce and sponsor would be 
incredibly impactful for families in all sorts of ways. Housing 
is bound up with opportunity. So it is not just about how much 
rent you are paying but it is also where you are living, where 
your kids are going to school. The promise of a housing voucher 
is to expand choice and opportunity for so many Americans 
denied it.
    The empirical research on this is very clear. When families 
have the opportunity to move to neighborhoods with lower rates 
of poverty, lower rates of crime, higher rates of public 
safety. Their lives are improved in so many different ways.
    Let me just give you one datapoint. Children who go to 
schools with higher levels of integration do far better their 
peers who go to segregated schools, even when those segregated 
schools are flooded with resources. So these programs work, not 
to mention just giving families a breath and relief so they can 
pay what they should be paying for housing costs instead of 
driving them into poverty.
    The institutional investment in our markets is the opposite 
of this. It is the view that housing is a commodity, that it is 
something that should only be for profit, and it is an 
opportunity denier and a poverty spreader.
    Senator Van Hollen. I appreciate that observation which is 
why this trend is alarming. The challenge we, of course, have 
is discrimination based on source of income, where, in certain 
places, I think the majority of places around the country, 
landlords can discriminate against people with vouchers because 
of the source of income. Can you talk about that challenge and 
whether it is made even more difficult if you have an 
institutional investor with no connection to the neighborhood?
    Mr. Desmond. So source-of-income discrimination, as you 
know, in most counties there is no law against just saying no 
to a family just because they have a voucher. The evidence 
suggests that when source-of-income laws are put in place they 
do help families get housed quicker and into better 
neighborhoods. There is a higher success rate with vouchers 
with those laws intact.
    With respect to institutional investors on this question, 
you know, when you take the landlord and tenant relationship 
that Mr. Dunn has so eloquently talked about today, and you put 
a lot of distance between folks that are working together, and 
you make that relationship purely financial, landlords do not 
have a lot of skin in the game to give tenants a break when 
their kid gets sick or when they have to go to a dentist 
appointment. So it does suggest that those landlords not only 
are going to react in a more kind of impersonal way, it 
suggests that they might build in a kind of discrimination that 
is beneficial to their profit motive, including source-of-
income discrimination.
    Senator Van Hollen. Thank you. There is a whole lot of 
additional territory to cover.
    Ms. Yentel, I just have a little bit of remaining time. 
Could you comment briefly on the Family Stability and 
Opportunity Vouchers Act and why it would be important to move 
that forward?
    Ms. Yentel. Well, it would be important for all the reasons 
Professor Desmond said. The only thing that I would add is that 
the legislation--500,000 new vouchers, targeted toward families 
with young children--could effectively end family homelessness. 
And the funds that are included for mobility counseling are 
especially important because that allows counselors to help 
these families with finding communities that are best for them 
and then helping them obtain and retain housing in those 
communities. So, it is a very important bill.
    Senator Van Hollen. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Chairman Brown. Thank you, Senator Van Hollen.
    Senator Cortez Masto is recognized from her office.
    Senator Cortez Masto. Thank you, Chairman Brown, Ranking 
Member Toomey.
    I want to start also by thanking Irene Gray, our 
stenographer, who has served the Senate for over 27 years. 
Thank you for your service, and I wish you well.
    I also want to thank the Ranking Member and the Chairman 
for this important hearing. Similar to what I have heard from 
all of my colleagues I, too, am concerned about institutional 
investors and the impact it is having in Nevada, where we are 
seeing all these properties being purchased.
    I know in my State, in 2021, 29 percent of the homes 
purchased in the Las Vegas metro area were bought by investors. 
My challenge is I cannot tell how many are institutional. I 
think it has everything to do with what I heard earlier about 
too many LLCs, not enough transparency, and being able to track 
this.
    Ms. Yentel, can I ask you, because we have heard the 
negative impacts by some of these institutional investors--I am 
not saying it is all of them but some of them that we have had 
and heard in our community--can you share some examples of 
communities effectively countering the pressures on home prices 
brought on by purchases from institutional investors?
    Ms. Yentel. So, I would say that the challenges that low-
income tenants face from institutional and other landlords are 
primarily based on the fact that we have few tenant protections 
throughout the country, and there is a tremendous power 
imbalance that tilts heavily in favor of landlords, especially 
institutional investors, at the expense of low-income renters. 
And so, we need to rebalance that power so it is more equal, 
and so tenants have protections against exorbitant rent hikes, 
against these kinds of fees for profit strategies, and against 
the increased evictions. And there is a whole set of tenant 
protections that should be implemented at the Federal, State, 
and local levels.
    Senator Cortez Masto. Well, let me ask you this as we talk 
about finding that balance, because I do think it is important. 
We were talking about vouchers and the positive impact it does 
have for stability for tenants, but can you talk a little bit 
about what vouchers also do and bring to property managers, and 
benefits as well?
    Ms. Yentel. Sure. It is reliable income for property 
owners, for landlords. If they have a tenant who has a Section 
8 voucher, then they will get regular rent paid each month, and 
they have the benefit of knowing that that rent will be stable 
and will be continuous. So, it is a benefit for landlords as 
well.
    Senator Cortez Masto. And also gives them the ability to 
prepare for and help them upkeep their property as well. Is 
that right?
    Ms. Yentel. Well, the rents are pegged at the fair market 
rate, which should be enough for landlords to be able to 
operate and maintain their properties.
    Senator Cortez Masto. Let me jump to Professor Desmond 
because you included manufactured home communities in your 
book, Evicted, and thank you so much for the work that you 
provided in Evicted. Very enlightening.
    Can I ask you this? The other area I am concerned about is 
manufactured homes being purchased by private equity as well 
and the impact that we are seeing also on the security and 
stability of the tenants. Can you talk a little bit about what 
you are seeing there as well with respect to our manufactured 
home communities? This is the first time I have heard so many 
in my State that are now losing their stability, losing their 
homes, and these private equity companies are coming in and 
purchasing up all of these communities.
    Mr. Desmond. Senator, I think your concern is warranted. 
What we have seen as institutional investors buying up 
manufactured housing, which is an enormous source of housing 
for low-income Americans, and often evicting entire mobile home 
parks and displacing entire communities.
    Let me just give you one example of how institutional 
investing is different, also, than just normal landlording. So 
only about 5 percent of Americans are paid on a monthly basis 
right now, but rent comes due at the beginning of the month. So 
for that 95 percent of Americans, often they cannot make rent 
during the first of the month.
    So if you have an institutional investor as your landlord 
you often get just an eviction notice by computer, by 
algorithm, and you pay to stay. You pay the late fees and the 
eviction fines to stay, but by our estimate that increases your 
housing costs by 20 percent, which means the rental housing 
crisis, as scary as it is on paper, is even worse if you are 
under those kinds of conditions.
    Senator Cortez Masto. Thank you. I noticed my time is up. 
Thank you again.
    Chairman Brown. Thank you, Senator Cortez Masto.
    Senator Smith, of Minnesota, is recognized.
    Senator Smith. Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thanks so much to 
all of our testifiers for being here today. It is extremely 
helpful.
    Two weeks ago in the Housing Subcommittee that I chair we 
held a hearing on homelessness and how we can work together to 
address this important issue, and as the Chair knows, Senator 
Rounds, my Ranking Member, and Chair Brown, and many 
Subcommittee Members were participating in that. It was very 
helpful. And it is directly connected to this hearing today 
because we know that without a safe, affordable place to live 
nothing in your life works, and at our Subcommittee all of our 
witnesses agreed that the primary cause of homelessness is, 
again, this deep under-supply of affordable housing.
    I think we are obviously seeing in this Committee hearing 
today that this housing supply problem affects all segments of 
the housing continuum, and we are seeing how these shortages 
are affecting the rental housing market, the home ownership 
market, and it is a big deal in rural and suburban and urban 
communities as well.
    So I want to come first to Dr. Desmond, thinking about this 
backdrop of the hearing a couple of weeks ago on homelessness. 
What do you see as the relationship between homelessness and 
the broader problem of housing affordability? Could you just 
talk a bit more about that homelessness issue?
    Mr. Desmond. Certainly, Senator. As Ms. Yentel offered in 
her comments, when the rent goes up so does homelessness. There 
is a direct connection between rental costs rising and shelter 
capacity expanding, people moving from a home they pay 50 
percent of their income to, to one that they pay 70 percent, to 
maybe their car, a shelter, to the street. So there is a direct 
link.
    The reporting out of California on this has been incredibly 
telling. Sixty percent of people that live on the street in 
Oakland are from Oakland, lived in Oakland, often were 
homeowners in Oakland, and through one reason or another, 
coming back to the housing crisis, ended upon the street as 
citizens and natives of that State.
    Senator Smith. And there is this misperception that people 
become unhoused or become homeless because they have an 
underlying health problem like a substance use disorder or 
mental health issue. But yet is it not true that those are the 
kinds of health issues that develop because you are 
experiencing homelessness?
    Mr. Desmond. Both can be true, but the intervention is very 
clear. You know, if you provide families homes first, no matter 
their mental health state or their struggles with addiction or 
other social problems they might be facing, when we intervene 
in their housing situation they get healthier, they can take 
their medication, we can provide stable and consistent mental 
health interventions.
    So, you know, it is not rocket science. The solution is 
housing.
    Senator Smith. The solution is housing, and this is not 
like we do not know what to do. It is just a question of 
whether we have the will to do it.
    So we acknowledge that there is a severe supply challenge 
with affordable housing. Some would argue that strategies like 
rental assistance basically serve to fuel demand for housing, 
thereby driving up housing costs, that it is not a supply side 
tool.
    Is that accurate? Ms. Yentel, would you like to respond to 
this? I mean, does not rental assistance make economics of 
affordable rentals work better for developer and rental 
property owners?
    Ms. Yentel. Yes. So, when it comes to very low, extremely 
low-income households, the amount that they can pay in rent 
without subsidies does not cover the costs to build and operate 
housing. So, Federal intervention in the form of subsidies is 
necessary, and Housing Choice Vouchers are highly effective in 
communities where there is a sufficient supply of homes but the 
people living in them cannot afford them. So, it acts as a 
bridge between what people can afford and what rent costs, and 
allows them to stay stably and affordably housed.
    Senator Smith. So to suggest, it seems to me, that these 
kinds of strategies, which are necessary to make housing 
affordable, is purely a demand-side solution and not getting 
the economics of having more affordable housing seems to me to 
be the right way of looking at this.
    Ms. Yentel. That is exactly right. As long as we have 
seniors or people with disabilities on extremely fixed incomes, 
as long as we have families working very low-wage jobs that are 
essential to our communities, we have to acknowledge that 
Federal subsidies are necessary to make homes affordable for 
them.
    And we have to fund those solutions at scale.
    Senator Smith. Earlier in the conversation that we have 
been having here there was a discussion that I really 
appreciated about how local zoning restrictions contribute to 
making affordable housing more expensive to build. My hometown 
of Minneapolis has done, I think, a model job of creating much 
more inclusionary zoning.
    Could you just briefly address what we could be doing at 
the Federal level to support that kind of local, more inclusive 
zoning?
    Ms. Yentel. And yes, your State is leading the way, really, 
for the country to look at ways to remove restrictive zoning. 
Local zoning is, as its name suggests, a local issue, but there 
are Federal incentives or requirements that can be put on local 
communities. If we look at the large pots of money that States 
and localities need to run their communities, we should put 
incentives or requirements on those funds for local communities 
to do more to remove restrictive zoning.
    Until we address all of the restrictive zoning that is 
inhibiting the supply of any kind of apartments--and especially 
affordable apartments, even if we are successful in getting the 
level of funding that we need from the Federal Government--we 
will not be able to build. So, the Federal Government should 
use the levers it has at hand to incentivize or require 
communities to do more.
    Senator Smith. Thank you very much. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
    Chairman Brown. Thank you, Senator Smith.
    Senator Warnock, of Georgia, is recognized.
    Senator Warnock. Thank you so very much, Chairman Brown.
    According to data from the 2020 American Community Survey, 
around 45 percent of Georgians spend more than 30 percent of 
their income on rent, and 1 in 5 spend more than half of their 
income on rent. We may assume that these numbers are from high-
rent cities but that is not true. It is not just high-rent 
cities. In both Jenkins County and Taylor County, two rural 
counties in the southeast part of my State, 1 out of every 3 
households--1 out of 3--spends more than half their income on 
rent.
    Georgians are being crushed by rent all over the State. 
There is no question that we need more housing stock, and I 
support many initiatives that would do just that. But Georgians 
do not have the luxury to wait. They are trying to pay the rent 
right now. They cannot wait several years for rents to fall. So 
even as we put forward policy that would increase housing stock 
we have to address the housing insecurity that people of 
Georgia are dealing with right now.
    Ms. Yentel, how long would you estimate that it will take 
for our housing supply to finally catch up to demand?
    Ms. Yentel. It will take years, if not more than a decade. 
It is a matter of this restrictive local zoning that needs to 
be addressed and removed, the supply chain issues, workforce 
issues, and many more issues, to build the housing. It will 
take many years for us as a country to dig ourselves out of the 
supply hole that we created.
    Senator Warnock. So we cannot wave a magic wand. It will 
not go away next year.
    Ms. Yentel. That is right.
    Senator Warnock. Or the year after that.
    Ms. Yentel. That is right.
    Senator Warnock. Or the year after that. So presumably 
rents will continue to rise in the meantime?
    Ms. Yentel. They will continue to rise. Maybe they will 
start to come down. Even if they do, when we look back to 
prepandemic times, many of those numbers in Georgia were likely 
the same. So, even if rents come back to where they were before 
the pandemic, there are 10 million households throughout the 
country that are paying at least half of their limited incomes 
on rent. So yes, they will continue to struggle.
    Senator Warnock. So we had this problem prior to the 
pandemic, which was then exacerbated by the pandemic. So do you 
think that offering tax cuts to rent-burdened families, to 
ordinary, hard-working families, would help bridge the gap 
until we can fully address the housing supply issue?
    Ms. Yentel. Absolutely. Cash in people's pockets helps them 
pay their bills. And whether it is in the form of continued 
extended child tax credits, which did more to help alleviate 
child poverty in our country than anything in recent time, or 
whether it is in the form of renters' tax credits that can also 
support low-income renters to afford the rent, they can have a 
meaningful impact on housing affordability.
    Senator Warnock. Right. I am a big proponent of tax cuts 
for hard-working, ordinary families who really could use it, 
and it seems to me that we need to provide solutions now, given 
the housing supply issue for Georgians who are feeling squeezed 
by the rent. And that is why I am offering and working on 
legislation right now to do just that, offer tax cuts to 
families with runaway rent costs.
    I want to pivot to another question in the few minutes I 
have. The Low-Income Housing Credit Program, also known as 
LIHTC, is the most important system for supporting the 
development of affordable housing. Since Congress created it, 
the LIHTC program has financed over 3.6 million affordable 
rental units. However, this affordability is only maintained 
during the tax credits time period, which is at least 15 years 
but could potentially be much longer.
    One way the affordable period can be reduced, though, is if 
the property owner requests regulatory relief through a 
qualified contract.
    Ms. Yentel, if I can ask you again, can you say more about 
what it means for a LIHTC property owner to request a qualified 
contract? What is that?
    Ms. Yentel. So, it means that owners can essentially get 
out of the length of the affordability requirements under the 
Low-Income Housing Tax Credit Program. It is something of a 
loophole in the program that needs to be closed.
    Senator Warnock. Great. I am sorry to interrupt but I am 
going to be out of time in just a moment. So if another entity 
buys this property they could raise the rent.
    Ms. Yentel. That is right, even after the Federal 
Government has expended resources to build and maintain that 
property.
    Senator Warnock. Do owners commonly inform the tenants of 
their buildings that their property might be sold and lose its 
affordability requirements?
    Ms. Yentel. They do not.
    Senator Warnock. They do not. Do you think it would be 
helpful for HUD to collect and publish data on the LIHTC 
program, for instance, whether property owners have waived the 
right to qualified contracts. Would that be helpful 
information?
    Ms. Yentel. Absolutely. More transparency in all Federal 
housing programs is a good thing. At the National Low Income 
Housing Coalition, we have a National Housing Preservation 
Database where we show where properties are at risk, not under 
qualified contracts but where their affordability is expiring 
in coming years, to give that data and transparency for local 
communities to come up with solutions. But HUD and the 
Department of Treasury can and should do more.
    Senator Warnock. Thank you so much. LIHTC has been very 
important around the affordability question, and I am working 
on legislation also that will allow us to collect and study 
data from the LIHTC properties in order to better the program. 
Thank you so very much.
    Chairman Brown. Thank you, Senator Warnock.
    I might add that Senator Warnock's comments about tax cuts, 
I might add for the benefit of his fellow Georgian on the 
panel, that Senator Warnock, about 18 months ago, almost as 
soon as he came to the Senate, joined me and Senator Bennet on 
working on the child tax credit, which, and we have talked 
about that, how that relieved the pressure for so many of your 
tenants, Mr. Dunn, for that year it was in effect. At the end 
of the month, when they got $250 or $300 tax credit it relieved 
the anxiety they felt to pay the rent and they did not have to 
deny their family or their children or themselves in those last 
days of the month. So thank you, Senator Warnock. Thank you.
    I will close. One of my favorite Abraham Lincoln stories is 
Lincoln one time said to his staff, who wanted to keep him in 
the White House and win the war and free the slaves, and 
preserve the union, and Lincoln said, ``No, I have to go out 
and get my public opinion bath.'' And Lincoln would do that 
when Presidents could do that, perhaps more openly than they 
can today.
    And I urge my colleagues to go out and meet people in their 
community who struggle to afford rent. Most of us do not 
interact a whole lot with people who are about to be evicted. 
They may call our office but we do not have that personal touch 
enough. I urge my colleagues, if we are not doing that as much 
as perhaps we should, to talk to their staff, talk to people 
who work at the front desk, who drove to work today, ask what 
it is like to rent in D.C. or in Tennessee or Georgia or 
Pennsylvania.
    Ask them how many times they have to call their landlord to 
get a repair made, whether it is a leak that goes unrepaired, 
what the rent increase was if they had to cross their fingers 
and hope the rising rent would not force them to move. Those 
are everyday stories of people we may come into contact with 
and do not explore and ask them questions. And I would hope 
more of us, including myself, would do that.
    Thanks to the witnesses, all five of you, remote and the 
four of you here.
    For Senators who wish to submit questions they are due by 
close of business 1 week from today, Tuesday, August 9th. To 
our witnesses, according to our Committee rules, we ask you to 
respond to any questions within 45 days from the day you 
receive them.
    Thank you again. The Committee is adjourned.
    [Whereupon, at 11:55 a.m., the hearing was adjourned.]
    [Prepared statements and responses to written questions 
supplied for the record follow:]
              PREPARED STATEMENT OF CHAIRMAN SHERROD BROWN
    Yesterday was the first of the month. For millions of Americans, 
that means the rent was due.
    And for many renters, that rent keeps going up and up.
    Two weeks ago in this Committee, we heard from witnesses about the 
soaring cost of housing and how it's hurting the millions of families 
priced out of buying their first home, and imperiling the renters who 
are just one illness or job loss or car repair away from eviction.
    This problem is squeezing people all across the country, working 
all kinds of jobs--even jobs that were supposed to be a ticket to the 
middle class.
    This isn't a new problem.
    For decades, so many Americans have struggled to scrape together 
the rent each month. Too many have lived in shoddy housing with 
rodents, mold, or broken appliances.
    That's why, 90 years ago, this country began investing in 
affordable housing--so that everyone would have a safe, affordable 
place to live.
    But the funding we put into that effort has never kept up with 
renters' needs, or even the basic maintenance of aging federally 
assisted housing.
    For the past decade, about half of renters have been paying more 
than \1/3\ of their incomes just to keep a roof over their heads.
    And renters' challenges are only getting worse.
    We're 3.8 million homes short of what we need. Not a single State 
in the country has enough housing.
    And for the lowest income renters, there are just 36 units 
affordable and available for every 100 renters who need them.
    That means renters can't vote with their feet in the housing 
market--because there's nowhere for them to go.
    The huge shortage of housing means that renters have to make do 
with what they've got--even if their house has dangerous lead paint on 
the walls, or the landlord won't fix the heat, or their bath tub has 
been clogged for weeks.
    And with housing so tough to find, renters are forced to ask 
themselves whether it's worth it to push for a repair from the same 
person who can put an eviction on their record and decide whether they 
have a place to sleep at night.
    The shortage of housing also means rents are going up for pretty 
much everyone.
    Rents are up 15 percent nationally, compared to just a year ago. In 
some cities, like Austin, Texas, or Newark in Senator Menendez's State 
of New Jersey, rents are up more than 25 percent.
    When rents rise, it makes everything just a little bit more 
precarious. More and more families are just one emergency away from 
losing their home.
    Renters see the pain from all these rent increases--the missed 
trips to visit family, the car repair they're forced to put off, the 
second job they have to take--just to make ends meet.
    Wall Street investors just see opportunity.
    They don't see the pain.or they just don't care.
    More and more, investors are buying up single-family homes--homes 
that first-time homebuyers usually buy--and renting them out at sky-
high rates.
    Twenty-eight percent of homes sold at the beginning of this year 
went to investors.
    Think about that:
    Investors, too often from out of town, who don't care about the 
community and just want to make a quick buck, are buying more than a 
quarter of homes--not families who want to put down roots, who dream of 
seeing their kids grow up there.
    That number is up from 16 percent just a couple of years ago. And 
the biggest investors with the deepest pockets--the ones who own more 
than 100 properties--nearly doubled their share of these purchases.
    Ms. Brunner has seen it first-hand in Cincinnati, where a single 
company based in Texas bought up 29 properties on one street in Price 
Hill. 29 properties on a single street.
    In that neighborhood, more than half of all homes are now rentals.
    And the city is left to chase down these out-of-State landlords who 
are letting homes fall apart.
    Families need a landlord they can talk to, who lives in the 
community.
    Cities need landlords who want to actually take care of their 
buildings, and help families stay in their homes.
    But big Wall Street firms promising investors double-digit yields 
and running up double-digit eviction rates are pricing out those who 
make a community home--good landlords, renters, first-time homebuyers 
alike.
    And they aren't just buying up single-family homes. They're also 
targeting mobile home communities and apartment buildings--anywhere 
that adds to their own bottom lines.
    Last week, the House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis 
published a report showing that, at the height of the pandemic, just 
four of these massive landlords filed nearly 15,000 evictions. 15,000.
    When a renter who has fallen behind on rent or can't get her 
landlord to fix their heat, we often hear that it's her individual 
problem.
    We hear that it's just between the renter and his landlord, or that 
his local government is to blame for its bad policies.
    And it's true that every eviction, every rent hike, every unlivable 
home is a personal crisis for an individual family.
    But all of these individual crises have added up to a big, national 
problem.
    It costs all of us more in education costs when kids have to change 
schools every 6 months.
    It costs all of us in lost productivity, when the workers 
supporting our businesses and schools, and our first responders, can't 
find an affordable place to live.
    It costs all of us more in health care, when people can't store 
their medicine because they don't have a place to live.
    This isn't someone else's problem. It affects all of us. And we 
need to work together to solve it.
    We have to expand the supply of safe, affordable housing across the 
country, for renters and homeowners, at all income levels.
    We have to maintain the affordable housing we currently have, so we 
don't fall even further behind on housing supply.
    And we have to help renters find and remain in homes they can 
afford with financial assistance, including emergency assistance, and 
support eviction prevention efforts, like mediation--through the 
Bipartisan Eviction Crisis Act.
    I look forward to hearing from our witnesses today about how we can 
tackle the challenges facing renters and grow the number of good 
landlords. It will benefit all of us.
                                 ______
                                 
            PREPARED STATEMENT OF SENATOR PATRICK J. TOOMEY
    Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Every month Americans are falling further and further behind 
because of President Biden's out of control inflation. Paychecks aren't 
keeping up with rising prices. After adjusting for inflation, wages 
have declined 5 percent since President Biden took office. Working 
Americans are getting poorer every day.
    Democrats' wasteful spending, growth-killing regulation and 
excessively accommodative monetary policy are exactly what led to 40-
year high inflation and contracted our economy. And what is the 
response of Democrats in Washington, DC? They want to jam through a 
reckless tax-and-spending bill that will make this disastrous situation 
even worse.
    Hiking corporate taxes will slow economic growth and especially 
harm America's manufacturing sector. And spending billions more will 
fuel inflation. This new wasteful spending will mostly go towards 
corporate welfare for green energy, subsidies for the wealthy to buy 
Teslas, and a political handout right before the elections to higher-
income Americans who buy Obamacare plans.
    In addition, the bill includes spending on housing, which is the 
topic of today's hearing. Under the Biden administration, the cost of 
housing has skyrocketed. House prices increased 18 percent in the last 
12 months. Rents jumped 14 percent.
    Affordable housing is growing further and further out of reach for 
many. But you wouldn't know that from reading the Democrats' bill. Its 
housing provision creates a $1 billion slush fund for ``greening'' 
subsidized housing. Because at a time of surging housing costs, of 
course, the solution is to put solar panels on Section 8 housing.
    As I've said before, Government, and especially this 
Administration, have often been the problem, not the solution, when it 
comes to housing. There are countless ways that needless Government 
regulation drives up housing costs time-consuming permitting processes 
drive up the cost of building new rental housing. Overly burdensome 
environmental impact reviews further add to that cost.
    Tariffs on steel, lumber, and other building materials have the 
same effect. Rent control laws reduce the supply and quality of rental 
housing. Demand-side housing subsidies get capitalized into higher 
house prices and higher rents.
    Loose GSE and FHA underwriting standards drive those house prices 
and rents still higher. The GSEs then respond by subsidizing investors 
in single-family rental housing, but that just further drives up house 
prices and crowds out aspiring homeowners.
    More recently, the Democrats and this Administration have taken 
this Government failure to the next level. They've dropped hundreds of 
billions of helicopter money to stimulate an already strong economy. 
$80 billion of that went to rental assistance, vouchers, and other 
housing subsidies, further inflaming demand.
    The President even extended the illegal eviction moratorium that 
has deterred investment in new rental housing and led to some renters 
not paying rent even when they could afford to. Predictably, landlords 
have responded by increasing rents and requiring larger security 
deposits.
    Today the Democrats will propose more of the same. We'll likely 
hear them make the case for new tenant protections. We'll likely hear 
them arguing for making the COVID rental assistance program permanent.
    But doubling down on failed liberal housing policies will not fix 
our rental housing market. Instead it'll just make housing more 
expensive. Today we'll also hear from landlords about how Government 
intervention makes it harder and more expensive to be a landlord, which 
leads to higher costs for renters.
    To improve housing affordability for all Americans--whether renters 
or owners--we should pursue reforms that leverage the power of free 
enterprise to increase housing supply and make markets more 
competitive. A healthy market competes not just on price but also 
service and product quality. To that end, we should scale back the role 
of Government and increase the role of private capital.
    We should avoid the temptation to adopt new so-called tenant 
protections or permanent rental assistance that will have negative 
unintended consequences, including increasing housing costs. We should 
phase-out demand-side subsidies that drive housing costs higher. We 
should end the failed GSE model that fosters excessive risk taking and 
contributes to a boom/bust housing cycle.
    Localities should revisit their permitting processes and other 
obstacles to new housing construction. We should prohibit the GSEs and 
other Federal programs from subsidizing rental units in jurisdictions 
that impose rent controls.
    We should get the GSEs out of the business of subsidizing single-
family home investors. And we should keep the GSEs focused on their 
affordability missions by keeping them out of social policy.
    Meanwhile, I hope the Administration will finally engage on reform. 
Treasury has still not met its obligation to deliver a housing reform 
plan to Congress--it's now 10 months overdue.
    Instead of pushing a reckless tax-and-spending bill, the 
Administration should look to opportunities for bipartisan 
legislation--like housing finance reform--that relies on free 
enterprise--not Government--to make housing affordable for all 
Americans, whether they own or rent.
                 PREPARED STATEMENT OF MATTHEW DESMOND
 Maurice P. During Professor of Sociology and Director of the Eviction 
                       Lab, Princeton University
                             August 2, 2022
[GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

                  PREPARED STATEMENT OF LAURA BRUNNER
  President and CEO, Port of Greater Cincinnati Development Authority
                             August 2, 2022
    Chairman Brown, Ranking Member Toomey, Members of the Committee on 
Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs: thank you for the opportunity to 
testify today on how renters and communities are impacted by today's 
housing market and how institutional investors are changing the 
landscape of single-family housing in Hamilton County.
    My name is Laura Brunner, CEO and President of The Port of Greater 
Cincinnati Development Authority. The Port is a public, 
quasigovernmental agency focused on mending broken real estate to 
promote job creation, home ownership, and equitable development 
throughout Hamilton County. Our work is guided by the belief that real 
estate should work for everyone.
    With tools, resources, and experience, The Port is in a unique 
position to pioneer diverse models of real estate equity, developing 
innovative solutions to complex issues. Our Public Finance Practice 
acts as a financing conduit, offering resources such as the issuance of 
tax-exempt debt, Property Assessed Clean Energy bonds, tax increment 
financing, among others, to further stimulate private investment in 
commercial real estate and fund critical economic development efforts 
across the region. Through our Driving Real Estate to Accelerate 
Microenterprise (DREAM) Loan fund, we've infused much-needed capital to 
projects in disinvested neighborhood business districts and minimized 
barriers for neighborhood microenterprise and entrepreneurs. The Port's 
Communities First Down Payment Assistance program offers downpayment 
and closing cost assistance grants to eligible homebuyers across the 
State.
    Our Neighborhood team focuses on the acquisition and rehabilitation 
of blighted residential and commercial properties to provide housing 
options across multiple price points from affordable to market-rate, 
resulting in the revitalization of neighborhoods and disinvested 
commercial districts. The Port operates the Hamilton County Landbank, 
whose mission is to return vacant properties back to productive use. In 
cooperation with our governmental and nongovernmental partners, the 
Landbank facilitates the rehab and reutilization of vacant, abandoned, 
or tax-foreclosed real properties until end users are identified for 
highest and best use of these properties. Since 2012, we have 
successfully disposed of more than 1,000 properties.
    The Homesteading & Urban Redevelopment Corporation (HURC) is 
another Port-operated entity dedicated to improving the quality of 
housing stock and increasing home ownership throughout the region. This 
program is primarily focused on income-qualified affordable homes and 
requires a significant amount of subsidy. With average sale prices for 
HURC homes ranging from $75,000 to $165,000, we are able to offer 
lower-cost options for buyers in low-to-moderate income areas. There is 
an estimated shortfall of 40,000 affordable housing units in Hamilton 
County and HURC is actively addressing this shortage by bringing much 
needed quality units online. \1\
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     \1\ https://www.lisc.org/greater-cincinnati/what-we-do/housing/
research/
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    The Port also leads a more targeted neighborhood real estate rehab 
initiative known as the Rehab Across Cincinnati & Hamilton County 
(REACH) program. REACH focuses on accelerating neighborhood 
reinvestment by acquiring and renovating pivotal blighted properties in 
target areas which have seen a long-term decline in housing value. It 
has a transformational impact on neighborhoods plagued with limited 
housing activity, creating new market comps and making communities 
attractive for future investment. Since 2015, The Port's residential 
program has created more than 100 renovated and new market rate and 
affordable homes across the region.
    Housing development is not simply a by-product of economic 
development; but rather, an engine of economic stability and growth. 
The Port recognizes that a sufficient supply of housing, affordable to 
households of all income, is the foundation for economic mobility and 
opportunity. Jobs provide financial stability, and homes create wealth. 
Real estate is one of the fastest ways to shrink the wealth gap and to 
help restore the middle class. In Cincinnati, Black home ownership is 
only 33 percent. Nationally, about 42 percent of Black households own 
their home, compared to 72 percent of White households, and ``if the 
typical Black-owned home was worth the same as the typical White-owned 
home, Black wealth would more than double.'' \2\ Housing and home 
ownership is the foundation of everything else in our lives, and for 
too long, the lingering legacy of redlining and segregation has stifled 
Black residents from the opportunity available to their White 
counterparts.
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     \2\ https://zillow.mediaroom.com/2021-04-26-Housing-Gains-Could-
Grow-Black-Wealth-More-Than-500-Billion-in-a-Decade
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    Home ownership remains an integral part of the American Dream. 
Owning a home is a symbol of financial success and a vehicle for 
accumulating wealth and building equity. However, the idea of the 
American Dream is even more so about opportunity and upward mobility. 
The reality is that not everyone wants to be a homeowner and not 
everyone has the means to purchase a home, but everyone should have 
access to a place to live and a pathway to home ownership. Locally, a 
recent report found that the Cincinnati metro area has more than 81,000 
extremely low-income renters, but only 33,000 available units they can 
afford. Roughly 67 percent of the extremely low-income households are 
severely cost burdened and spend more than half of their income on 
rent. \3\ Access to affordable rentals and the ability to save enough 
money to purchase a home have become increasingly hard today, partly 
due to institutional investors infiltrating the housing market across 
the country.
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     \3\ https://nlihc.org/gap/state/oh
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    Our attention to investor activity in the local housing market came 
out of a conversation with the City of Cincinnati's property 
maintenance division and quality of life team around code enforcement. 
We wanted to know who the worst landlords in the Cincinnati area were. 
It took months of rigorous research to uncover that over 4,000 single 
family homes in Hamilton County had been purchased by just five 
institutional investors since 2013. Tracking the acquisitions was an 
arduous task and required review of numerous real estate transactions 
and auditor data in an effort to connect large corporate investors 
organized as Real Estate Investment Trusts (REITs) and LLCs to specific 
names. Property purchase price information was limited because of 
varying LLC names and a long list of transfers to themselves. 
Eventually, we were able to track consistencies in owner name and 
addresses on the Hamilton County Auditor's website. Tracking this 
information was messy work, but it led us to the same five worst 
landlords identified in our initial conversation with the City. The 
results are sobering. Through our research, we uncovered over 90 
different LLC's affiliated with VineBrook Homes, the largest outside 
investor in the regional housing market. It became very clear that this 
ownership structure is based on the maximization of profit by hiding 
behind a cloak of anonymity.
[GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

    As evidenced by the City of Cincinnati's lawsuit against VineBrook 
last year, the lack of transparency with this type of investor model 
results in poorly maintained properties and negligent landlord 
practices. The failure of an investor of this magnitude has harrowing 
consequences on a community. We've been told by institutional investors 
that they only own about 1 percent of single-family homes; however, in 
Hamilton County, this could mean 50 percent of the houses on a single 
street. When the geographical impact is so concentrated, it has a game-
changing effect on what it means to live in that neighborhood. It has 
an impact on ownership, where more than half of the homes on one street 
are converted into rental properties. It has an impact on neighboring 
homes, where surrounding properties see a downward pressure on property 
values. It has an impact on the overall fabric of a community. This 
model is opportunistic, not strategic, and it's happening at the 
expense of the most vulnerable members of our society.
    Since the foreclosure crisis of 2008, institutional investors have 
been purchasing large volumes of single-family homes in the region and 
turning them into high-priced rental properties. What we found in our 
research is that they typically purchase homes in geographically 
targeted areas, usually the region's most disinvested neighborhoods. 
They make all-cash offers for the properties and box out first-time and 
lower-income buyers. Our low home values and high rental market make 
these properties attractive. It's a cash cow for investors but a money 
pit for renters.
[GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

    Institutional investors found a very profitable new sector. They 
claim to be responding to existing demand and limited supply. Yes, 
demand may be high, and supply may be limited, but in the Cincinnati 
region, these investors are not building new homes or expanding 
options. They are switching homeowner properties to rental properties 
and hiking up rents. Studies have found that investor landlords are 
also more likely to evict their tenants and poorly maintain their 
properties. \4\ They are maximizing profits at the expense of 
vulnerable tenants and fundamentally changing the landscape of single-
family housing in the region. In Q2 of 2021, one in six home sales were 
purchased by large investors, and we know that is significantly higher 
at price points below $250,000. Just last month, Cincinnati had the 
largest jump in rental prices in the country. Monthly rent for single-
family homes in the area increased $267, or 23 percent, in the past 
year. \5\ These are the types of numbers that made it clear to us that 
it was our moral imperative to interrupt the cycle of investor activity 
in the local real estate market and make a radical change.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \4\ https://www.nytimes.com/2022/04/23/us/corporate-real-estate-
investors-housing-market.html
     \5\ https://blog.dwellsy.com/single-family-rentals-drive-rent-
increases-may2022/
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    In December 2021, The Port placed a bid on 194 single-family homes 
formerly owned by a California-based firm that fell into receivership. 
Because of our public and private relationships, and the depth of our 
work in the region, Colliers International (a real estate broker with 
offices in Cincinnati and the receiver of this portfolio) reached out 
to The Port looking to sell. We couldn't help but see this opportunity 
as the antidote to the threat. Purchasing the portfolio could chart a 
new path back to home ownership for these families and properties. In 
late January 2022, The Port closed on this acquisition and launched the 
Creating Affordable Real Estate (CARE) Homes Initiative.
    To our knowledge, no other institution has ever taken on a project 
similar in scope and challenge to this purchase. It is a high-risk 
acquisition; but because of our risk tolerance, we were able to create 
an innovative financing model that included no public subsidy. The Port 
leveraged its nontax revenue to issue taxable and tax-exempt bonds to 
pay $14.5 million to acquire the portfolio of homes, outbidding over a 
dozen investment firms. An Ohio-based investor purchased the bonds 
issued to provide the financing to purchase the properties.
    The Port's intent with the CARE Homes initiative is to create 
viable pathways to home ownership for current rental tenants of these 
homes. The properties purchased in our portfolio are predominantly 
located in low-income disinvested census tracts. Data shows that in 
Hamilton County, Ohio, the median household income in 2019 was just 
over $57,000 annually. In the City of Cincinnati, the median household 
income was a little over $42,000 annually. As a result of corporate 
ownership, many of the residents of the CARE Homes portfolio have had 
minimal opportunity to accumulate wealth through equity. Changing that 
narrative is the driving force behind what we are doing. Through 
financial and home ownership training, we believe we can create a sea 
change in our neighborhoods when it comes to transitioning from renting 
to home ownership. This program is about longevity and building 
communities rich in opportunity for local families.
[GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

    For this initiative to be successful, we knew we had to leverage 
strong community partnerships. As a result, we formed the CARE Homes 
Advisory Group, a diverse group of local nonprofit partners and housing 
advocates, including: The Legal Aid Society of Greater Cincinnati, the 
Community Action Agency, Metropolitan Area Religious Coalition of 
Cincinnati (MARCC), Housing Opportunities Made Equal (HOME), the 
Homeownership Center of Greater Cincinnati, Working in Neighborhoods 
(WIN), Talbert House, Price Hill Will, Sisters of Charity, Santa Maria 
Community Services, the Local Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC), 
and the Cincinnati Metropolitan Housing Authority (CMHA.) Each of these 
organizations play an important role in navigating the complexities of 
this initiative.
    Our collaborative approach led us to partner with a local, HUD-
certified homebuyer training nonprofit. Working in Neighborhoods (WIN) 
will provide assessment, financial literacy training, and homebuyer 
education for all interested tenants to best position them for 
stability and wealth creation as they take the step to buy their homes. 
WIN trains more than 300 families per year through its home ownership 
program and has achieved a 95 percent retention rate of their 
participant's ability to close on and maintain their homes. In 
addition, more than 10,000 residents have sought out WIN for their home 
ownership assistance, creating a pipeline of future home buyers. They 
truly are an ideal partner for this mission.
    Of course, bold ideas rarely come without big challenges. We 
quickly learned that the reality of the portfolio of homes posed 
difficult financial, operational, and physical challenges. As we 
continue to evaluate the condition of each home, early indications show 
a considerable amount of work needed to stabilize and improve several 
of these properties. Many have code violations and necessary 
maintenance that were left unaddressed and deferred when purchased by 
the previous investor. It's clear that some of these homes have not 
been touched or upgraded since they were built in the 1950s. 
Furthermore, our portfolio is debt financed and operates without public 
subsidy, meaning limited access to flexible cash and no financial 
cushion to rely on. Balancing the financial performance needs of the 
homes with the human needs of tenants struggling with increasing costs 
of living is extremely challenging. This reality reinforces the 
significance of the portfolio purchase and The Port's efforts to 
interrupt the cycle of investor ownership of these properties. It is 
clear that when an investor squeezes a single-family house for profit, 
the community is left holding the bag.
    The question then becomes, ``Can this model be replicated?'' Our 
answer to that question is yes. It can, and it should; but it is not to 
be taken lightly. Taking on high-risk projects with high-interest debt 
rather than grant funds isn't easy. It can be replicated when there are 
entities and organizations that can merge private sector speed with 
public sector mission-based approaches. Larger development financers 
perceive our CARE Homes financing model as a type of Environmental, 
Social, Governance (ESG) bond, a quickly growing area of the bond 
market. We know there is a way to leverage the growing interest for ESG 
to do similar initiatives in other markets.
    The Port's CARE Homes initiative is a critical intervention that 
disrupts institutional investors' constraints on local families and 
properties. The purchase of this portfolio protects renters from the 
threat of rising rent prices while offering them a pathway to home 
ownership. As we navigate the complexities of our new initiative, it is 
clear that much more work is needed to combat the impact of predatory 
housing practices of institutional investors. Now, more than ever, bold 
policies and leaders are needed to ensure the housing market meets the 
needs of its community. Housing is a basic human need, and we strongly 
believe that everyone deserves the right to live in a decent and safe 
home. The Port has worked diligently over the years to restore 
neighborhoods and communities to places of opportunity. By adding to 
our housing supply and putting properties back to productive use, we've 
been able to provide housing affordability and ownership opportunities 
to residents and drive lasting change in our region. Investor activity 
in the single-family housing market poses a direct threat to the 
revitalization and growth of our neighborhoods--the change we worked so 
hard to build over the years. When presented with the opportunity to 
buy the CARE Homes portfolio, we did not hesitate. We knew it was our 
duty to play a part and make real estate work for our community, 
particularly our most vulnerable residents.
    Chairman Brown, Ranking Member Toomey, and Members of the 
Committee, thank you again for the opportunity to testify before you 
today. I look forward to your questions.
                                 ______
                                 
                  PREPARED STATEMENT OF ROSANNA MOREY
                          Small Property Owner
                             August 2, 2022
    Thank you for the invitation to testify today and the opportunity 
to share my story.
    My name is Rosanna Morey, I live on Long Island in New York, and am 
a small landlord of an owner-occupied home with a rental unit. I am a 
single mom with an incurable cancer that progressed before the pandemic 
began. I rented the apartment in my home, on a month-to-month lease to 
help with bills and to ease the burden on my life. As my health 
declined, I saw no other option but to speak to the tenant and provide 
notice for her to vacate so that my sister could stay with me to help 
me and my teenage son who has learning disabilities. She refused, and 
so began holdover filings and proceeding.
    The pandemic hit and the eviction moratorium was put in place, 
which, by the way, was originally intended only for nonpayment and 
COVID-related hardship cases. But, somehow, all cases were lumped 
together. It did not take long for the tenant to stop paying rent. 
``Because I effing can, and you can thank your governor for that'' was 
the response she gave a police officer when he asked why she continued 
to stay.
    I had to work three jobs while undergoing treatments to make ends 
meet. She spitefully and incessantly smoked, knowing that I was sick 
and that it made me violently ill. She violated the lease, which 
clearly prohibited smoking because my son was asthmatic; she didn't 
care and there was nothing I could do about it.
    I could go on with countless stories; thanks to Governor Hochul's 
and Federal eviction moratorium extensions, this tenant was basically 
given the right to abuse the situation. She was allowed to live rent 
free for 2 years, ignore any and all rules outlined in a binding lease 
agreement that she signed and agreed to, and allowed her to destroy my 
property knowing there would be no recourse.
    I was one of the very lucky people who received money from the 
Landlord Rental Assistance Program, or LRAP, New York's emergency 
rental assistance program for landlords whose tenants were unwilling to 
apply for Federal emergency rental assistance. However, it was only 1 
year's rent that I had to pay income taxes on, but the tenant was not 
required to pay taxes on the forgiven debt. The money from LRAP did not 
cover her entire back rent, nor the $10 thousand in legal fees, nor the 
$25 thousand it cost me to rebuild and clean the area that she 
destroyed, even leaving feces everywhere.
    The overall aftermath and any new regulations that landlords would 
be subjected to will continue to drive them away from renting out 
properties. Policies such as the eviction moratorium led to abuse as in 
my case and many others and has caused a 2-year backlog in court. This 
has contributed to the housing shortage because landlords are still 
housing nonpaying tenants while waiting for their due process. ERAP/
LRAP also did not really help landlords because a tenant that expects 
the Government to pay will simply not pay their own rent. This 
perpetuates a ``who cares'' attitude and impacts landlords' 
livelihoods. Worse yet, permanently creating an emergency rental 
assistance program just makes it easier for Government officials to re-
impose an eviction moratorium or lockdown orders, something we can all 
agree is bad.
    The eviction moratorium that occurred during COVID led to 
Government interference beyond what should have ever been allowed. The 
Government should not discourage landlord participation as that will 
just drive them away and make housing more expensive for all.
    With too many restrictions, affordable housing providers like 
myself will reconsider renting going forward. Some will just sell and 
leave, some will put more stringent requirements and tenant screening 
criteria in place, and some will just raise the rents to cover 
themselves ``just in case.'' We are already starting to see the impact 
as social media videos have begun to circulate teaching prospective 
tenants how to create fake W2's and bank statements, etc. because so 
many chose not to pay rent that now they cannot provide the documents 
required for a new apartment. This cannot continue.
    Today, I am asking policymakers to consider landlords, particularly 
small mom-and-pop landlords, and single parent landlords trying to make 
ends meet, and sick landlords like myself just trying to get by, 
because after all, we have families to support too.
    Thank you and I look forward to answering your questions.
                                 ______
                                 
                   PREPARED STATEMENT OF DARION DUNN
                 Managing Partner, Atlantica Properties
                             August 2, 2022
    Chairman Brown, Ranking Member Toomey, and Members of the 
Committee, good morning. Thank you for the invitation to testify today 
and share my story. My name is Darion Dunn. I'm the Managing Partner of 
Atlantica Properties, a company that I started with my younger brother 
and business partner, Trenton Dunn. Atlantica Properties is a real 
estate investment and development firm with a mission to empower 
individuals by establishing thriving, holistic communities. I am a 
member of the Atlanta Apartment Association, the Georgia Apartment 
Association and the National Apartment Association. I was born and 
raised in Atlanta, GA, by parents who taught me that ``home'' is more 
than a place--it is an ideal. I graduated from Georgia Tech where I 
studied Civil Engineering and Economics, and it was during those 
formative college years that my passion for real estate and affordable 
housing was set into motion.
    I knew at an early age that I wanted to help shape the world's 
built environment. So, I've dedicated my life's work to creating and 
preserving affordable housing. After acquiring my first rental property 
over 20 years ago, I have since participated in the ownership, 
management and development of nearly 1,000 housing units. I know that 
expanding affordable housing in our Nation is possible and critical to 
solving our housing affordability challenges, but the Government, at 
all levels, must empower, not restrict housing providers from doing 
what they do best, providing places to call home for our residents at 
all income levels.
    My company is able to offer affordable rents in part because we 
have a thoughtful, long-term approach to property ownership. We have 
owned many of our rental properties for over a decade, while nearby 
properties have traded hands upwards of 5 times during the same period.
    I'm fortunate to have built a successful real estate company that 
operates on an institutional level, yet I've never forgotten my humble 
beginnings as a landlord with very limited resources. I saved money 
from my day jobs for the downpayment for single family rental homes and 
apartment properties. It's not surprising that the majority of rental 
homes and small multifamily properties in this country are owned by 
individuals or small businesses like mine. In fact, over 70 percent of 
tenants in the United States live in properties that have 20 units or 
less, including single family homes.
    Although small landlords represent a large majority of the rental 
property industry, it is far too common for policymakers to overlook 
the contributions and struggles of this group of business owners.
    My privilege and responsibility to provide housing to our residents 
includes keeping my business viable so I can continue to serve those 
that are most vulnerable to the ever-worsening-affordability crisis. 
Government actions that raise my costs or reduce my revenue, ultimately 
impact my residents and my ability to provide affordable housing.
    Our tenants are our partners, and our business cannot exist without 
them. The symbiotic relationship between tenants and landlords was put 
on full display during the height of the COVID pandemic. The financial 
pain felt by tenants was ultimately felt by landlords, and vice versa. 
Fortunately, my company didn't have a large percentage of delinquent 
tenants during the pandemic like many others in my industry.
    However, we did have tenants who were unable or unwilling to pay 
rent for extended periods of time, with the worst case being a current 
tenant that hasn't paid rent since October 2020. Local and Federal 
eviction moratoriums prevented us from taking responsible legal action.
    While we have fortunately been able to withstand these challenges, 
the majority of small landlords can't sustain these types of setbacks. 
Emergency rental assistance programs have been a welcomed safety net, 
although many housing providers have experienced significant delays in 
receiving these funds, due to challenges with local execution of the 
program.
    Despite Federal resources to help during the pandemic, the 
inventory of affordable housing is eroding as small landlords opt to or 
are forced to sell their properties. With supply already outstripped by 
demand, we cannot afford to lose these market players.
    We need more mission-driven housing providers. So, I support 
business practices and public policies that strengthen the tenant-
landlord bond, as opposed to those measures that pit one side against 
the other. Examples include lease insurance to cover property damage 
and lost revenue; reform of the Section 8 program; incentives to 
encourage housing preservation and conversion of unused commercial 
property to housing; and access to favorable debt and equity for non-
LIHTC deals.
    Evictions are a last resort, but we must ensure that moratoriums 
don't discourage vulnerable populations from paying their rent and 
building their credit. For example, our company doubled down on tenant 
financial literacy training during the pandemic. We educated tenants on 
the importance of avoiding eviction filings and creditor collections. 
We also implemented a program to report positive rent payments to the 
credit bureaus, which has led to 75 percent of our tenants improving 
their credit scores.
    I will close by reiterating that to address our housing 
affordability challenges we must both increase supply and provide 
incentives to strengthen the tenant-landlord relationship. There is 
still time to restore the legacy of affordable housing in America, and 
I promise to continue my efforts to make the ideal of ``home'' a 
reality for generations to come.
    Thank you for the opportunity to be here today. I look forward to 
answering any questions.
                   PREPARED STATEMENT OF DIANE YENTEL
        President and CEO, National Low Income Housing Coalition
                             August 2, 2022
[GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

        RESPONSES TO WRITTEN QUESTIONS OF CHAIRMAN BROWN
                      FROM MATTHEW DESMOND

Q.1. Addressing Homelessness--Recently we have heard proposals 
to criminalize homelessness, including imposing fines or 
criminal penalties for people experiencing unsheltered 
homelessness. What effect do you believe proposals to 
criminalize or otherwise penalize people experiencing 
homelessness are likely to have? What do we know about the best 
ways to address homelessness?

A.1. Proposals to criminalize behaviors and activities 
associated with homelessness have been made across the United 
States. Several localities have adopted such proposals into 
law. Often referred to as civility laws, quality-of-life 
ordinances, or other similar terms, such laws come in many 
forms, from fines and forced relocations to banishment and 
imprisonment. Designed around the goals of enhancing public 
safety and guiding people living on the street to services, 
civility laws, research has shown, are not very effective when 
it comes to addressing homelessness or poverty. Moreover, they 
inflict harm on individuals and divert resources from policies 
and interventions shown to be more effective. \1\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \1\ National Law Center on Homelessness and Poverty, ``Housing Not 
Handcuffs 2019: Ending the Criminalization of Homelessness in U.S. 
Cities'' (Washington, DC: National Homelessness Law Center, 2019), 50-
53; Forrest Stuart and Katherine Beckett, ``Addressing Urban Disorder 
Without Police: How Seattle's LEAD Program Responds to Behavioral 
Health-Related Disruptions, Resolves Business Complaints, and 
Reconfigures the Field of Public Safety'', Law & Policy 43 (2021): 390-
414, 390.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Quality-of-life regulations impose fines or other sanctions 
for behaviors and activities associated with homelessness 
(e.g., sleeping on the sidewalk, panhandling). Studies have 
tracked a steady increase in and expansion of quality-of-life 
laws and regulations over the past several decades. As they 
have increased in number, they have become more expansive in 
reach. In a 2018 survey conducted by the National Homelessness 
Law Center, 72 percent of cities had at least one law 
restricting camping in public and 76 percent of cities 
prohibited scavenging in garbage or dumpsters. In practice, 
these regulations effectively criminalize street homelessness 
itself. \2\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \2\ National Law Center on Homelessness and Poverty, 2019, 38, 41, 
44, 47; Steve Herbert and Katherine Beckett, `` `This Is Home for Us': 
Questioning Banishment From the Ground Up'', Social & Cultural 
Geography 11 (2010): 231-245.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Studies have demonstrated that the effects of laws 
criminalizing behaviors associated with homelessness include a 
loss of social networks for unhoused people. When a person is 
banished from a public space, for example, and ordered or 
forced to move, he is cut off from the people and places he 
knows, including services and resources such as shelters he 
might use. Laws target by association, as well. People or 
groups not experiencing homelessness themselves, but delivering 
services, resources, and aid, can be cited, fined, and ordered 
to leave in certain jurisdictions. In direct contradiction to 
their stated goals, such laws have been shown to drive unhoused 
people to avoid systems and services. \3\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \3\ Herbert and Beckett, 2010, 236-237; Katherine Beckett and 
Steve Herbert, ``Penal Boundaries: Banishment and the Expansion of 
Punishment'', Law & Social Inquiry 35 (2010): 1-38, 18, 20; Forrest 
Stuart, ``From `Rabble Management' to `Recovery Management': Policing 
Homelessness in Marginal Urban Space'', Urban Studies 51 (2014): 1909-
1925, 1920; Stuart and Becket, 2021, 395.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Laws criminalizing homelessness have also been found to 
cause a loss of employment and the creation of additional 
barriers to attaining jobs and securing better living 
conditions and housing. By exacerbating the challenges they 
face, such laws make it more difficult for people living in 
deep poverty to establish stability in terms of income or 
housing, thereby reducing the chances they will escape 
homelessness. Researchers have linked civility laws to 
heightened levels of hostility, rejection, harassment, and 
violence experienced by unhoused people. The impact of 
banishment, a particular type of punishment imposed on an 
individual through quality-of-life ordinances, has been 
compared to the pain and trauma experienced by incarceration. 
\4\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \4\ Herbert and Beckett, 2010, 237, 239; National Law Center on 
Homelessness and Poverty, 2019, 1516; Bidish Sarma and Jessica Brand, 
``The Criminalization of Homelessness: Explained'', The Appeal, June 
29, 2018; Sara Rankin, ``Should Homelessness Be a Crime? Our State 
Grapples With Its Answer'', Firesteel, August 27, 2014; Beckett and 
Herbert, 2010, 5-6, 15, 19; Steve Herbert, Katherine Beckett, and 
Forrest Stuart, ``Policing Social Marginality: Contrasting 
Approaches'', Law & Social Inquiry 43 (2018), 1491-1513, 1499; Stuart, 
2014, 1922; Forrest Stuart, ``On the Streets and Under Arrest: Policing 
Homelessness in the 21st Century'', Sociology Compass (2015) 940-950, 
947.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Civility laws increase the chances that people living in 
homelessness will encounter the criminal justice system through 
arrest or actual incarceration. Among the people incarcerated 
in this country's jails and prisons, unhoused people are 
overrepresented. Research shows that many civility laws violate 
civil liberties and due process afforded by the Constitution, 
which correlates with studies that show such laws reduce 
unhoused people's trust in law enforcement. \5\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \5\ Stuart and Beckett, 2021, 392, 394; Herbert and Beckett, 2010, 
235, 242; Sarma and Brand, 2018; Herbert, et al., 2018, 1499; Rankin, 
2014; Beckett and Herbert, 2010, 7; National Law Center on Homelessness 
and Poverty, 2019, 15.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Studies have shown that laws criminalizing homelessness 
typically do not reduce crime or homelessness. Across the 
country, as laws criminalizing homelessness have increased, the 
number of people experiencing homelessness has continued to 
rise. \6\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \6\ Herbert and Beckett, 2010, 233; Herbert, et al., 2018, 1499, 
1502; Beckett and Herbert, 2010, 15; National Law Center on 
Homelessness and Poverty, 2019, 15, 27; Beckett and Stuart, 2010, 15.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Civility laws do not address the root causes of 
homelessness. In his seminal analysis of the causes of 
homelessness, Dennis Culhane emphasized the need to account for 
the complex interdependence of both structural and individual 
factors. While several pathways to homelessness, or structural 
factors, are at work, so too are the actions, choices, and 
circumstances available to individual people; both must be 
accounted for in considering why they become unhoused. By 
putting the focus on the individual person experiencing 
homelessness as the cause and source of that homelessness, 
civility laws disregard the structural factors contributing to 
it. \7\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \7\ Sarma and Brand, 2018; Stuart, 2014, 1917; Herbert, et al., 
2018, 1499, 1502; Stuart and Beckett, 2021, 394; Dennis Culhane, ``On 
Becoming Homeless: The Structural and Experiential Dynamics of 
Residential Instability'', 1990, 267-268.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Research also demonstrates that laws criminalizing 
homelessness are expensive to enforce and lead to increased 
costs for towns and cities. Those costs will likely continue 
increasing as civility laws continue to be proposed and 
enacted. Once passed, they divert funds, steering money and 
attention away from interventions that could dig below the 
surface to better address the root causes of homelessness and 
poverty. \8\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \8\ National Law Center on Homelessness and Poverty, 2019, 16; 
Herbert, et al., 2018, 1502; Sarma and Brand, 2018.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Addressing homelessness in full will require a mix of 
programs and policies--from the immediate and temporary to the 
short- and long-term. Examples of immediate and temporary 
interventions that have had some success include using vacant 
and surplus parking lots to provide a safe and legal place for 
people living out of cars, and the provision of alternative 
locations before police sweeps of encampments. Examples of 
short- and long-term ways to address homelessness include 
eliminating exclusionary zoning and allowing for the creation 
of community land trusts, accessory dwelling units, tiny homes, 
and other types of new housing accommodations. \9\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \9\ National Law Center on Homelessness and Poverty, 2019, 91-93, 
97, 102.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Programs and policies that have had some success in 
addressing homelessness include those designed to get people in 
homes. Housing first and supportive housing policies, which 
remove requirements that are often associated with housing 
programs, are reported to have helped Bergen County, New 
Jersey, end chronic homelessness, and Charlotte, North 
Carolina, reduce arrests by 82 percent. But we must not limit 
ourselves to reactive solutions. We must support proactive 
approaches, as well, and look to policies designed to keep 
people in homes. An eviction can be the last thing keeping 
someone from becoming unhoused. If we are to address 
homelessness, we must do a better job of preventing evictions. 
Data show that preventing evictions is an efficient and 
feasible way to reduce homelessness. Expanding protections for 
low income renters, through legislation guaranteeing the right 
to counsel in housing cases and other interventions, could also 
help prevent homelessness before it happens. \10\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \10\ National Law Center on Homelessness and Poverty, 2019, 20; 
Devin Rutan and Matthew Desmond, ``The Concentrated Geography of 
Eviction'', The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social 
Science 693 (2021): 64-81, 64, 66.

Q.2. State and Local Experiences of Eviction--Have you observed 
differences in the frequency of eviction filings or evictions 
between localities and States? To what do you attribute these 
differences? Do you have recommendations for ways to ensure 
that renters are protected from avoidable evictions no matter 
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
where they live?

A.2. Variations in eviction rates have been observed across 
States and cities as well as across neighborhoods and 
buildings. Factors explaining these differences range from 
high-level policies, in particular State laws and regulations, 
to the decisions of individual landlords. To better protect 
tenants from avoidable evictions, the Federal Government could 
issue national guidance to promote policies and interventions 
that have been shown to be effective, in addition to making a 
series of more direct interventions.
    From 2000 to 2018, the average annual number of eviction 
filings in the United States exceeded 3.6 million, equating to 
seven filings each minute. Yet evictions do not take place in 
the same way or with the same frequency in each part of the 
country. Researchers have observed significant differences in 
eviction and eviction filing rates across county, State, and 
regional lines. Data from 2000 to 2018 reveal a higher rate of 
eviction filings in Southeastern American States than in any 
other region of the country. While the filing rate in South 
Carolina topped 23 percent in 2018, it was roughly half of that 
in North Carolina at 11.7 percent. That same year, West 
Virginia and Pennsylvania had more comparable filing rates--
roughly 5 and 7 percent respectively--though nearby Maryland's 
filing rate approached 70 percent. Yet even within the same 
State, eviction caseloads differ drastically from city to city. 
A renter in Austin, Texas, for instance, faces a lower risk of 
eviction than one in Houston. Geographic variance was observed 
before the pandemic and has continued after most pandemic 
protections have ended. \11\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \11\ Ashley Gromis, Ian Fellows, James Hendrickson, Lavar Edmonds, 
Lillian Leung, Adam Porton, and Matthew Desmond, ``Estimating Eviction 
Prevalence Across the United States'', Proceedings of the National 
Academy of Sciences 119 (2022): 1-8, 3, 5; Lillian Leung, Peter 
Hepburn, and Matthew Desmond, ``Serial Eviction Filing: Civil Courts, 
Property Management, and the Threat of Displacement'', Social Forces 
100 (2021): 316-344; Peter Hepburn, Olivia Jin, Joe Fish, Emily 
Lemmerman, Anne Kat Alexander, and Matthew Desmond, ``Preliminary 
Analysis: Eviction Filing Patterns in 2021'', Eviction Lab, March 8, 
2022; National Eviction Map, Eviction Lab, Princeton University, 2022.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    How can such variations in eviction rates across the 
country be explained? What is more, how can they inform Federal 
strategies for protecting renters from avoidable evictions, no 
matter where they live? Research has demonstrated that State 
and local laws have a direct impact on eviction rates. In the 
case of the previously cited Maryland, for example, the 2018 
filing rate of 70 percent resulted in large part from State 
housing law, which strongly incentivized property owners to 
open an eviction case on any tenant who fell behind. 
(Maryland's eviction judgment rate in the same year was lower 
than its filing rate.) Laws pertaining to three specific 
issues--namely, waiting periods between eviction notice and 
filing, eviction filing fees, and attorney representation in 
court--play a crucial role in determining the frequency of 
evictions. Eviction data reveal three major points around which 
the Federal Government can craft national guidance for States 
and localities on how to protect renters from avoidable 
evictions. \12\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \12\ Gromis, et al., 2022.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    First, researchers have identified notice requirements, or 
the amount of time a landlord must give a tenant after notice 
but prior to an eviction being filed, as a strong indicator of 
divergent filing rates across States. When no notice is 
required, eviction filing rates run high; when more notice is 
required, filing rates run low. Studies indicate that 
standardizing the notice periods required in jurisdictions to 7 
or 14 days would help prevent avoidable evictions. Including 
the right to cure, or the right for tenants to stay in place 
after being served an eviction if they pay all back rent and 
late fees, in notice requirements would create further 
regulatory protections for renters. \13\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \13\ Leung, et al., 2021, 339; Gromis, et al., 2022; Philip 
Garboden and Eva Rosen, ``Serial Filing: How Landlords Use the Threat 
of Eviction'', City & Community 18 (2019): 638-661.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Second, researchers have observed an inverse relationship 
between eviction filing fees and filing rates in the case of 
serial filings. When filing fees are lower, eviction filing 
rates are higher; when fees are higher, eviction rates are 
lower. Evidence demonstrates that, as legal and regulatory 
factors such as fees slow down the eviction process and/or make 
it more expensive for landlords, the less likely it is that 
they will utilize serial filing as a source of revenue. On top 
of this, regulations on the fees that landlords can charge and 
collect from tenants during the eviction process would create 
an additional layer of protection for renters. \14\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \14\ Gromis, et al., 2022; Leung, et al., 2021, 70.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Third, when it comes to attorney representation in housing 
court, tenants are outnumbered. Although many localities 
mandate that corporate landlords hire attorneys in civil 
eviction cases, tenants do not have the right to legal 
representation in such cases in most cities and States. While 
roughly 80 percent of landlords are represented by attorneys 
when they come to housing court, only 3 percent of tenants are. 
In jurisdictions that have enacted right to counsel 
legislation, tenants involved in eviction cases are more likely 
to remain in their homes. In Cleveland, for example, 93 percent 
of represented renters facing eviction avoided displacement. 
Federal right to counsel legislation will require strong 
bipartisan support. But passing a national law is not the only 
way the Federal Government can help call attention to tenants' 
right to counsel as a tool for preventing avoidable evictions. 
Congress could work to deepen Federal investment in the Legal 
Services Corporation (LSC). LSC funds could be used to support 
tenants in housing court and help reduce the stark disparity in 
attorney representation. \15\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \15\ John Pollock, ``Using Right to Counsel as an Eviction 
Diversion Strategy'', National League of Cities, 2022; ACLU, No 
Eviction Without Representation: Evictions' Disproportionate Harms and 
the Promise of Right to Counsel (Washington: ACLU Research Brief, 
2022), 10; Ingrid Gould Ellen, Katherine O'Regan, Sophia House, and 
Ryan Brenner, ``Do Lawyers Matter? Early Evidence on Eviction Patterns 
After the Rollout of Universal Access to Counsel in New York City'', 
Housing Policy Debate 31 (2021): 540-561.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Drilling down to the more local level, research has 
revealed variations in eviction and eviction filing rates 
between rural and urban areas, from neighborhood to 
neighborhood, and among individual buildings. Eviction is more 
common in some neighborhoods than in others because a 
relatively small number of landlords, and therefore buildings, 
evict large numbers of tenants every year. As few as 100 
buildings drove one in six evictions in Cleveland and two out 
of every five evictions in both Fayetteville, North Carolina, 
and Tucson, Arizona. Moreover, researchers have found that 
large-scale property owners evict tenants more frequently than 
small-scale owners do. A forthcoming study focused on public 
housing authorities (PHA) as a specific subset of largescale 
landlords indicates variation in the number of serial eviction 
filings--multiple evictions filed against the same household at 
the same address by the same landlord--among PHAs from State to 
State. \16\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \16\ Matthew Desmond and Carl Gershenson, ``Who Gets Evicted? 
Assessing Individual, Neighborhood, and Network Factors'', Social 
Science Research (2016): 1-16; Robert Goodspeed, Elizabeth Benton, and 
Kyle Slugg, ``Eviction Case Filings and Neighborhood Characteristics in 
Urban and Rural Places: A Michigan Statewide Analysis'', Housing Policy 
Debate 31 (2021): 717-735; Devin Rutan and Matthew Desmond, ``The 
Concentrated Geography of Eviction'', The ANNALS of the American 
Academy of Political and Social Science 693 (2021): 64-81; Henry 
Gomory, ``The Social and Institutional Contexts Underlying Landlords' 
Eviction Practices'', Social Forces 100 (2022): 1774-1805; Lillian 
Leung, Peter Hepburn, and Matthew Desmond, ``No Safe Harbor: Eviction 
Filing in Public Housing'', Forthcoming; Leung, et al., 2021, 316-319.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Just as variations in eviction data have been observed in 
relation to landlords and property owners, so have they been 
observed in relation to tenants. Research has demonstrated that 
eviction impacts renters living in distinct locations at 
differing rates. On the whole, Black and Latinx renters, and 
women in particular, disproportionately carry the weight of 
evictions in the United States; they are threatened with 
eviction more often, and they are evicted more frequently, than 
White renters. Black and Latinx renters are also the most 
likely to receive serial eviction filings compared to White 
renters. The same forthcoming study on PHAs previously cited 
indicates that PHA residents face a far greater risk of being 
filed against serially than their counterparts renting in the 
private market. Among several other reasons, these findings are 
noteworthy because research has shown that landlords utilize 
serial filings to earn additional revenue from tenants. \17\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \17\ Peter Hepburn, Renee Louis, and Matthew Desmond, ``Racial and 
Gender Disparities Among Evicted Americans'', Sociological Science 7 
(2020): 649-662; Gomory, 2022; Leung, et al., 2021, 316-319.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Research suggests an opportunity for the Federal Government 
to offer guidance to States and localities on targeting top 
evictors through regulation. Variations in eviction rate by 
neighborhood and at the building level are significant because 
they identify discretion as a critical determining factor in 
eviction filings, highlighting the extent to which some 
landlords turn to eviction more readily than others. Targeted 
interventions directed at eviction hotspots and serial evictors 
might include building inspections and tax audits of landlords 
and corporations that own buildings responsible for a 
disproportionate number of filings in any single locality or 
State. With studies revealing a link between eviction filing 
rates, top evicting landlords, and levels of neighborhood 
instability, regulating practices by the individual and 
corporate landlords, as well as the public housing authorities, 
responsible for the majority of eviction filings would benefit 
not only renter households but also the community writ large. 
\18\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \18\ Desmond and Gershenson, 2016; Rutan and Desmond, 2021, 78-79.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    To fully address evictions and protect renters and families 
across the country from avoidable evictions, we need short- and 
long-term solutions, from the local through the national level. 
Beyond offering guidance to States and localities, the Federal 
Government can work to protect renters from avoidable evictions 
in three key ways: by extending the Emergency Rental Assistance 
(ERA) program, by increasing the total supply of both housing 
choice vouchers and affordable housing, and by collecting 
eviction data on a national scale.
    The ERA program was responsible for historic reductions in 
residential instability during the height of the pandemic. At 
the end of 2021, several months after the national eviction 
moratorium expired, eviction filings were down 53 percent in 
Albuquerque, New Mexico, for example. ERA funding protected 
renters in various ways, including through rental assistance 
and eviction diversion programs. Renters with no savings and 
unstable incomes often need only a small amount of rental 
assistance to avoid an eviction. Research has shown that, 
although most evictions are for one or two months of rent, many 
eviction cases are initiated for relatively small sums of 
money. For example, in 2021, one in seven eviction cases in 
Cincinnati involved a claim of less than $500. In many cities, 
including Philadelphia and Durham, ERA funding was used to 
implement diversion programs, which typically combine legal 
representation, rental assistance, and remediation to prevent 
evictions and have been shown to help prevent forced moves. 
With ERA funds nearing or at their end, however, rental 
assistance, diversion programs, and other policies centered on 
renter protections will be difficult for localities and States 
to maintain. Extending and expanding the ERA program, by tying 
it to diversion programs for instance, would address immediate 
needs while also helping to prevent evictions going forward. 
\19\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \19\ Eviction Tracking System, Eviction Lab, Princeton University, 
2022; Hepburn, et al., 2022; Renee Louis, Alieza Durana, and Peter 
Hepburn, ``Preliminary Analysis: Eviction Claim Amounts During the 
COVID-19 Pandemic'', Eviction Lab, Princeton University, August 27, 
2020; Mark Treskon, Solomon Greene, Olivia Fiol, and Anne Junod, 
``Eviction Prevention and Diversion Programs: Early Lessons From the 
Pandemic'' (Washington, DC: Urban Institute, April 2021); Juan Pablo 
Garnham, ``Eviction Diversion: Preventing Eviction Before Going to 
Court'', Eviction Lab, Princeton University, September 2, 2021; 
Jennifer Ludden, ``Eviction Filings Are Up Sharply as Pandemic Aid 
Starts To Run Out'', NPR, May 4, 2022; Veronica Gaitan, ``The Central 
Importance of Housing'', Housing Matters, November 2, 2017.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Another way for the Federal Government to address our 
Nation's immediate needs is to increase the number of housing 
choice vouchers. The Family Stability and Opportunity Vouchers 
Act, introduced in the Senate in 2021, would create 500,000 new 
housing vouchers for families in need and would improve 
services to increase housing and neighborhood choice. Given 
that families spend an average of 26 months on waiting lists 
for rental assistance, this act would increase residential 
stability and help to prevent family homelessness. In the 
longer term, we need to increase the supply of affordable 
housing by deepening investments in development and expanding 
public housing offerings. Research shows that families with 
access to safe, affordable housing are healthier, happier, and 
better able to save money so that they can plan for their 
longterm futures. \20\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \20\ Public and Affordable Housing Research Corporation, ``Trends 
in Housing Assistance and Who It Serves'', 2019, 13.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Finally, the Federal Government should begin collecting 
data on evictions and eviction filings on a national scale. 
While recent studies have allowed us to make critical advances 
in our knowledge of evictions in the United States, they also 
underscore the need for ongoing and extensive study. In 
particular, they point to the dire need for the Federal 
Government to collect eviction-related data. The U.S. 
Department of Housing and Urban Development could collect and 
track high-quality information on evictions, both in subsidized 
properties run by public housing authorities in its purview, 
and in rentals on the private market.
    Reliable data on evictions enable us to assess the scope of 
the problem and to evaluate the effectiveness of housing 
policies at the local, State, and Federal levels. These data 
provide a powerful lens for understanding the prevalence, 
causes, and consequences of housing instability. They are also, 
however, the only tool with which the Federal Government can 
detect violations of the Fair Housing Act caused by the 
eviction process. And they require large-scale data 
infrastructure and resources. The only source of national data 
on eviction comes from the Eviction Lab at Princeton 
University. The Federal Government taking the lead in data 
collection would, in tandem with the other interventions 
recommended above, help prevent evictions going forward and 
would add to a more comprehensive and informed public policy. 
\21\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \21\ Gromis, et al., 2022.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                ------                                


        RESPONSES TO WRITTEN QUESTIONS OF CHAIRMAN BROWN
                       FROM LAURA BRUNNER

Q.1. Addressing the Growth of Institutional Investor Owners--
Ms. Brunner, your testimony included many of the challenges for 
communities and families that are caused when institutional 
investors buy up homes. What solutions are you at The Port and 
other communities across the country pursuing to address these 
issues? What State or Federal changes would help address these 
issues?

A.1. The Greater Cincinnati area, like many jurisdictions 
across the Nation, continues to grapple with housing inventory, 
housing affordability, and an influx of institutional investors 
targeting the single-family housing market. Just last year, 
real estate investors bought $750 million worth of homes in 
Columbus, Cleveland, and Cincinnati. \1\ When institutional 
investors buy homes in bulk quantities like this, it poses 
serious challenges for communities and families, resulting in a 
difficult market for private homebuyers, and a tough rental 
market for those seeking affordable housing. Cincinnati rents 
rose 26 percent year over year in August. It is the largest 
percentage jump in rents among the top metropolitan areas in 
the country, and the second time in the past 3 months in which 
Cincinnati has led the Nation in fastest pace of rent 
increases. \2\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \1\ https://www.redfin.com/news/investor-home-purchases-q4-2021/
     \2\ https://www.redfin.com/news/redfin-rental-report-august-2022/
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    In January 2022, The Port of Greater Cincinnati Development 
Authority outbid over a dozen investment firms and purchased 
194 single-family homes that were formerly owned by a 
California-based firm and fell into receivership. It was our 
opportunity to disrupt the cycle of investor activity in the 
local real estate market and chart a new path back to home 
ownership for families and properties. It was a high-risk 
acquisition, but because of The Port's risk tolerance, we were 
able to create an innovative financing model that included no 
public subsidy. The Port leveraged its nontax revenue to issue 
taxable and tax-exempt bonds to pay $14.5 million to acquire 
the portfolio of homes. An Ohio-based investor purchased the 
bonds issued to provide the financing to purchase the 
properties.
    The goal of the CARE (Creating Affordable Real Estate) 
Homes initiative is to create viable pathways to home ownership 
for current rental tenants of these homes. As a member of the 
economic development community, The Port recognizes both the 
moral and the business-driven imperatives to ensuring people 
have a chance to build wealth. Purchasing the CARE Homes 
portfolio created an opportunity for us to provide shortand 
long-term solutions for renters and neighborhoods across 
Hamilton County. We were able to prevent immediate eviction and 
displacement of tenants. After acquiring the portfolio, we 
identified 160 delinquent renters, ranging anywhere from one 
month to over a year of delinquency. Through constant and 
diligent communication, we were able to submit 57 rental and 
utility assistance applications on behalf of our tenants and 
secured $274,000, with $236,000 currently under review. In 
addition, we signed up eight tenants for Section 8 assistance, 
all of whom did not know they were eligible.
    Of the 60 vacant properties in the portfolio of homes, six 
were re-leased after moderate rehabilitation, roughly 10 were 
shown to Community Development Corporations and community 
partners, one sold to a volunteer rehab program, six are 
currently being bid for renovation, and the remaining vacant 
properties are in the planning phase and will move forward with 
renovations in suitable order. Renovations range from minor 
issues such as a new coat of paint, to major interior and 
exterior repairs of leaky roofs or rotted framing. Maintaining 
and improving these properties gives us an opportunity to 
convert the single-family homes from rental back to owner-
occupied, further increasing the available supply of affordable 
homes and meeting the housing needs of low- and moderate-income 
families in our region.
    Though the intent of the CARE Homes initiative is to offer 
a pathway to home ownership, we understand that not all tenants 
are able or even want to purchase their home. To assist tenants 
with this process, we partnered with a local, HUD-certified 
homebuyer training nonprofit. Working in Neighborhoods (WIN) is 
providing renter counseling and transition planning for those 
who prefer to continue renting, as well as assessment, 
financial literacy training, and homebuyer education for those 
interested in home ownership. Our goal is to best position our 
tenants for stability and wealth creation as they take the step 
to buy their homes. To date, eight tenants have started or are 
currently in the screening process.
    We strongly believe that what we are doing will help 
provide stability to residents and neighborhoods and have a 
major impact on the local housing market. Everyone deserves a 
safe, affordable place to live, but large investor purchases of 
residential property like we're seeing in Hamilton County is 
adding to the housing crisis and threatening housing 
affordability for the lowest-income households in our 
community. The CARE Homes initiative is not a silver bullet by 
any means, but it is a creative response to a very complex 
problem. Now more than ever, comprehensive policy solutions and 
significant Federal investments are needed to combat the 
shortage of affordable and available housing, as well as the 
massive movement of private equity into single-family housing 
markets.
    The Emergency Rental Assistance (ERA) program is assisting 
several tenants in our CARE Homes portfolio who are facing deep 
rental and utility debt. Though a temporary measure, the 
current distribution of ERA funds and backlog of assistance 
applications is a true testament to the significant role rental 
assistance plays in addressing housing needs among families 
with the lowest incomes. Locally, the Cincinnati-Hamilton 
Community Action Agency (CAA) is assisting with the allocation 
of these funds and has distributed over $30 million to more 
than 7,000 households since February 2021. With a backlog of 
6,000 applications to process, CAA suspended new applications, 
further proving the remaining need for assistance is still very 
high. \3\ Congress must expand investments in rental and 
utility assistance to relieve the current backlog of 
applications and help those in dire need.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \3\ https://spectrumnews1.com/oh/columbus/news/2022/09/19/
emergency-rental-assistance-deadline-looms-as-agencies-manage-massive-
case-backlog
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    In addition to providing emergency assistance to stabilize 
renters from unforeseen crises such as the COVID-19 pandemic, 
governmental agencies must address housing affordability and 
availability issues by strengthening existing Federal financing 
and offering long-term, sustainable solutions. Expanding the 
capacity of Low-Income Housing Tax Credit and increasing 
funding in Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) 
programs, such as Community Development Block Grants and the 
Housing Trust Fund, would play a significant role in preserving 
and increasing affordable housing supply. In order to have a 
real impact, Federal policies must include incentives for State 
and local jurisdictions to reduce restrictive zoning and land-
use regulations. Constraints on land development, including 
density limitations, minimum parking requirements, and historic 
preservation requirements, increases costs and hinders growth.
    These efforts will have minimal impact unless there is 
Government intervention around abusive practices of 
institutional investors in the single-family housing market. If 
left unchecked, big corporations and investors will continue to 
take homes off the market and push up prices to increase 
personal profit margins, all at the expense of the most 
vulnerable members of our communities. One way to discourage 
institutional investor ownership of single-family homes is to 
make the model less attractive to investors. Currently, the 
cashflow is sheltered by depreciation. In the early years, as 
they are purchasing properties, the depreciation is a major 
advantage. They are able to make cash distributions, and 
because of depreciation, they are tax-free. Single family homes 
are depreciated at a rate of 3.636 percent each year for 27.5 
years. One way to disincentivize this is to specifically target 
single family home depreciation and make it like commercial 
real estate, which is depreciated over a period of 39 years.
    Another way to reduce the attractiveness of these 
investments is to preclude investment in single family homes as 
an eligible asset class for opportunity zone funds.
    At the State and local level, efforts should be made to 
increase the reporting requirements to improve transparency. 
This would also help ensure that these landlords are not 
receiving preferential tax treatment such as homeowner credits 
on property taxes.
                                ------                                


        RESPONSES TO WRITTEN QUESTIONS OF SENATOR SMITH
                       FROM LAURA BRUNNER

Q.1. One way to support the construction of new units is to 
look at restrictive zoning rules that make it difficult to 
build new properties. Restrictive local zoning rules are a 
topic that has generated bipartisan interest. My home town of 
Minneapolis has been a leader in tackling zoning issues as a 
way of expanding affordable housing. As a quasipublic real 
estate developer, I'm sure you have an interesting perspective 
on this issue.
    In your experience, how do restrictive zoning or land use 
rules affect affordable housing supply?

A.1. Zoning requirements such as density, parking, height, and 
setback, remain a significant barrier to housing affordability 
and development. Diversifying the housing stock in 
neighborhoods results in better access to economic opportunity. 
In Hamilton County, with over 49,000 households severely cost-
burdened and spend more than 50 percent of their income on 
housing costs, there have been efforts to reduce density 
limitations as a way to combat the shortage of affordable 
housing. \1\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \1\ chrome-extension://efaidnbmnnnibpcajpcglclefindmkaj/https://
www.lisc.org/media/filer-public/a1/16/a116fbab-4be3-4704-98e6-
83f633b7d893/asset-upload-file30-13212.pdf
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Large sections of Cincinnati are zoned single family or 
have a minimum lot sizes that are extremely large. If a 
developer or builder wants to construct a multifamily or even 
split their lot to add density, they are required to go in 
front of the zoning board and ask for a variance. This creates 
three barriers to development, the first being the hearing adds 
additional time (6-8 weeks minimum) to the development 
timeline, and even the application fees and required 
documentation are costly.
    The process to rezone a property can be extremely 
burdensome, especially for an individual new to development or 
someone looking to build for the first time. More often than 
not, a builder will end up hiring a consultant or engineer to 
draw up the required documentation and walk the project through 
the process which adds considerable costs. Those who cannot 
afford to do so may eventually choose not to move forward with 
a project.

Q.2. How do these restrictions affect the cost of building?

A.2. In addition to these restrictions, the rising costs of 
building materials has made it extremely difficult to expand 
affordable housing. While a $1,000 application fee for a 
variance might not seem excessive, it's the difference between 
including the refrigerator in the structure or not. It is 
practically impossible to build affordable housing units 
without subsidy and every dollar truly matters. Also set back 
requirements can vary in different areas thus eliminating the 
potential for a standardized infill structure that could be 
ordered and constructed in bulk. Many of these neighborhoods 
were decimated by the foreclosure crises and therefore have 
multiple vacant lots on streets that were previously bustling 
with activity. Being able to have a few standardized 
floorplans/structures that could be constructed in bulk would 
not only give the developer economy of scale savings but would 
also simplify the construction process overall leading to a 
larger pool of contractors able to participate in the bidding 
process.

Q.3. What is our best tool for incentivizing affordable housing 
supply?

A.3. Housing development incentives can help accelerate and 
expand affordable housing in many ways. Expanding the capacity 
of Low-Income Housing Tax Credit and increasing funding in 
Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) programs, 
such as Community Development Block Grants and the Housing 
Trust Fund, would play a significant role in preserving and 
increasing affordable housing supply. In addition to funding 
incentives, regulatory incentives such as flexible design 
standards and density bonuses could allow for additional 
density and increased production of affordably priced units.
    In order to have a real impact, Federal policies must 
include incentives for State and local jurisdictions to reduce 
restrictive zoning and land-use regulations. Constraints on 
land development, including density limitations, minimum 
parking requirements, and historic preservation requirements, 
increases costs and hinders growth. Local government should 
simplify the development approval process at the permitting 
level and reduce the fees for each step to help incentivize 
affordable housing supply.
                                ------                                


        RESPONSES TO WRITTEN QUESTIONS OF CHAIRMAN BROWN
                       FROM DIANE YENTEL

Q.1. Addressing Homelessness--Recently we have heard proposals 
to criminalize homelessness, including imposing fines or 
criminal penalties for people experiencing unsheltered 
homelessness. What effect do you believe proposals to 
criminalize or otherwise penalize people experiencing 
homelessness are likely to have? What do we know about the best 
ways to address homelessness?

A.1. Efforts to criminalize homelessness or impose punitive 
requirements are counterproductive and make it more difficult 
for people to exit homelessness. Nearly all people experiencing 
homelessness are not unsheltered by choice but because they 
lack access to affordable housing, physical and mental health 
care, or adequate and humane emergency shelter. Arrests, fines, 
incarceration, and criminal records make it more difficult for 
individuals experiencing homelessness to access the affordable 
housing, health services, and employment necessary to exit 
homelessness.
    Proposals that impose punitive requirements--such as time 
limits, work requirements, forced treatment, and sobriety--are 
ineffective and ignore the primary driver of homelessness: the 
severe shortage of housing affordable to the lowest-income and 
most marginalized people. Forcing people into congregate 
shelters and using a mandatory, punitive, behavior modification 
approach is based on outdated models that failed to rehouse 
people. These earlier models set housing as the end goal--
requiring individuals to first participate in various 
supportive programs, abstain from drugs and alcohol, and adhere 
to set a of behavioral requirements before accessing housing. 
Costs were very high, and results were very limited. Rather 
than responding to individuals' needs, participants would often 
become stuck at a certain point during the program or fall 
short of unattainable requirements. Individuals unable to 
succeed in the one-size-fits-all approach languished in large 
shelters or were forced into institutions, with no path back to 
housing.
    To end homelessness, policymakers must invest in proven 
solutions at the scale necessary. Housing First is a 
bipartisan, evidence-based practice supported by multiple, 
national studies that show it is the most effective approach to 
ending homelessness for most individuals and families. In 
addition to being a proven strategy to end homelessness, 
Housing First is a responsible, accountable way to spend 
taxpayer dollars on homelessness issues because it can improve 
quality of life and other outcomes, lead to better treatment 
outcomes, and reduce taxpayer spending on public services, 
including emergency health and criminal legal systems.
    Under the Housing First model, stable, affordable, and 
accessible housing is provided to people experiencing 
homelessness quickly and without prerequisites, and voluntary 
supportive services--such as substance use and mental health 
counseling and employment training, among others--are offered 
to help improving housing stability and well-being. It is a 
flexible model that can be adapted to address the unique needs 
in local communities and tailored to the challenges facing 
individuals.
    Housing First is not ``housing only.'' It includes an array 
of support services needed to live stably in the community. 
Housing First recognizes that stable housing is required for 
effective psychiatric and substance use treatment and for 
improved quality of life. Once stably housed, individuals are 
better able to take advantage of wraparound services to help 
support housing stability, employment, and overall health. 
Without stable housing, attaining these goals becomes much more 
difficult.
    The Housing First model rapidly ends homelessness for most 
individuals and families. The model is particularly effective 
among people who have been homeless for long periods of time 
and have serious psychiatric disabilities, substance use 
disorders, and/or other disabilities.
    Further, this model is more effective at increasing service 
utilization than non-Housing First programs and can lead to 
better treatment outcomes. While an earlier study found no 
difference in treatment outcomes between Housing First and 
high-barrier programs, several more recent studies indicate 
that Housing First participants are more likely to report 
reduced usage of alcohol, stimulants, and opiates. Critics' 
fears about increased substance use and psychiatric symptoms 
have not been supported by research findings.
    Finally, the Housing First model is more cost-effective 
than allowing people experiencing homelessness to remain in 
shelters, jails, or hospitals. Housing First can improve health 
care and employment outcomes and reduce arrests and 
incarceration. Studies show that Housing First reduces costly 
hospital visits, admissions, and duration of hospital stays 
among homeless individuals, and reduces public system spending.

Q.2. State and Local Experiences of Eviction--Have you observed 
differences in the frequency of eviction filings or evictions 
between localities and States? To what do you attribute these 
differences? Do you have recommendations for ways to ensure 
that renters are protected from avoidable evictions no matter 
where they live?

A.2. During the pandemic, States and localities across the 
country have recognized the vital role tenant protections play 
in preventing evictions. NLIHC has been tracking the passage of 
tenant protections and found that in 2021 alone, States and 
localities passed or implemented over 150 new laws or policies 
to protect tenants from eviction and keep them stably housed.
    Research from Princeton University's Eviction Lab found 
that eviction moratoriums--especially those that froze the 
earliest stages of the eviction process--were effective in 
reducing eviction filing rates. However, State-level eviction 
prevention policies enacted during the pandemic varied 
significantly, leaving some renters with far more protection 
than others. While policies specifically designed to shield 
households from eviction and housing instability were 
effective, variations in statewide renter protections meant 
that where a renter lived had a significant impact on how well 
they were protected from eviction.
    Some States have enacted laws preempting local governments 
from adopting critical renter protections. According to the 
Urban Institute, as of 2020, 33 States had preemption laws in 
effect that prevent local governments from adopting some type 
of affordable housing or tenant protection, such as source-of-
income discrimination protections, short-term rental 
regulations, and inclusionary zoning policies. Texas, Iowa, and 
Indiana enacted State laws barring cities and counties from 
adopting and enforcing source-of-income antidiscrimination 
laws. Texas's law preempts measures passed in Austin and Dallas 
that prohibit source-of-income discrimination. Three cities in 
Iowa--Des Moines, Iowa City, and Marion--have such ordinances 
in effect and must adjust to the new State law by 2023. While 
Atlanta passed a source-of-income antidiscrimination law in 
2020, the ordinance is not legally enforceable because it 
conflicts with a State law barring local governments from 
expanding the State's fair housing law, which does not prohibit 
source of income discrimination.
    The patchwork of State and local renter protections, as 
well as State preemption of local housing policies, place low-
income renters in communities across the country at greater of 
risk of eviction, and in worst cases, homelessness. A lack of 
Federal renter protections allows corporate landlords to 
purchase properties and engage in abusive practices in pursuit 
of profit. Real estate investors have been buying low-cost 
homes at an increasing and unprecedented rate, leading to 
increases in rental prices and putting low-income renters at 
greater risk of eviction. Increased institutional investor 
ownership in the rental market can have negative impacts on 
renters, and has been associated with decreased affordability, 
increased fees, lack of upkeep, higher rates of eviction, and 
worsening displacement, particularly within Black 
neighborhoods.
    To ensure the safety and just treatment of renter 
households across all jurisdictions, Congress should enact 
legislation to establish critical national protections for 
renters. Congress should prohibit source-of-income 
discrimination to help ensure that landlords do not 
discriminate against renters who receive rental assistance or 
other sources of income. Additionally,
    Congress should establish and fund a national right to 
counsel to help more renters stay in their homes and mitigate 
harm when eviction is avoidable. Further, NLIHC supports 
legislation to create Federal ``just cause'' eviction standards 
to ensure greater housing stability and prevent arbitrary and 
harmful actions by landlords. Congress should enact additional 
measures to protect renters nationwide, including expanding the 
``Fair Housing Act'' to ban discrimination based on sexual 
orientation, gender identity, marital status, and source of 
income; establishing anti-rent gouging protections for renters; 
ending arbitrary screening and eviction policies to ensure 
access for people exiting the criminal legal system; and 
supporting tenant organizing.
    In the absence of quick Congressional action, the Biden 
administration must take immediate steps to protect America's 
lowest-income and most marginalized renters from the harmful 
impacts of inflation and rising rents, high rates of eviction 
filings, and increasing homelessness. To respond to 
unprecedented and unwarranted increases in rent prices and 
housing instability, the Biden administration should establish 
critical renter protections to help keep renters stably housed. 
Just as several States have in place laws to prevent price or 
rent gouging after natural disasters, the Biden administration 
should implement anti-rent gouging measures to prevent 
landlords from imposing exorbitant rent increases on tenants in 
the wake of a global pandemic. There is clear precedent and 
need for using Federal price controls to stem unreasonable rent 
increases.
    The Biden administration should also expand renter 
protections, such as source-of-income protections, just-cause 
eviction standards, and anti-price gouging protections, to 
those living in properties with federally backed mortgages. 
There is recent precedent for tying renter protections to 
federally back loans and other assistance. During the pandemic, 
the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) required that 
property owners receiving forbearance suspend evictions for 
nonpayment of rent, and the agency prohibited these property 
owners from charging late fees or penalties or requiring 
tenants to pay past due rent in a lump sum. Property owners who 
failed to comply with these renter protections were subject to 
remedies under their loan documents, which could include moving 
the loan into a technical default and revocation of the 
forbearance.
                                ------                                


        RESPONSES TO WRITTEN QUESTIONS OF SENATOR SMITH
                       FROM DIANE YENTEL

Q.1. In May, the Biden administration announced a ``Housing 
Supply Action Plan'' to ease burden of housing costs by 
boosting the supply and quality of housing. The initiative 
includes legislative and administrative actions, including 
efforts to:

    Provide new financing mechanisms to preserve and 
        build more affordable housing where gaps currently 
        exist;

    Reward jurisdictions that have reformed their 
        zoning and land-use policies; and

    Improve and expand existing Federal financing.

    And just last week, the Biden Treasury Department announced 
new guidance to allow States and local governments greater 
flexibility in boosting housing supply using ARP dollars.
    Do you have thoughts on whether these initiatives will be 
helpful?

A.1. The Biden administration's ``Housing Supply Action Plan'' 
includes important measures to increase the supply of housing. 
The Administration's commitment to using Federal transportation 
funds to reduce restrictive local zoning laws, which can 
inhibit or prohibit the construction of apartments and are 
often deeply rooted in racial exclusion, is especially 
promising. By supporting manufactured housing, accessory 
dwelling units, and small-scale developments, the 
Administration can increase affordable housing options in 
communities nationwide. Streamlining Federal financing and 
funding sources can help lower costs and speed development.
    An underlying cause of America's housing crisis is a market 
failure that results in a severe shortage of rental homes 
affordable to people with the lowest incomes. Nationwide, there 
is a shortage of seven million homes affordable and available 
to extremely low-income renters. The Administration's Housing 
Supply Action Plan outlines a series of actions to increase the 
supply of housing, but these measures will not reach people 
with the lowest incomes without additional Federal subsidy. 
Without public subsidy, the private market cannot produce new 
rental housing affordable to extremely low-income households 
because the rents that are affordable to the lowest-income 
households typically do not cover the development costs and 
operating expenses of such new housing. Because the private 
market consistently fails to provide adequate, affordable 
housing for extremely low-income households, the Government has 
a critical role to play in correcting this structural failure.
    The Administration cannot solve the crisis on its own. In 
addition to outlining steps the Administration is taking to 
lower housing costs, the Biden administration's Housing Supply 
Action Plan calls on Congress to enact investments in housing 
development and preservation.
    To increase the supply of deeply affordable and accessible 
housing, Congress should expand funding for the national 
Housing Trust Fund to at least $40 billion annually. The HTF is 
the only Federal housing program exclusively focused on serving 
households with the lowest incomes and most acute housing 
needs. The ``American Housing and Economic Mobility Act'' (S. 
1368/H.R. 2768), introduced by Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) 
and Representative Emanuel Cleaver (D-MO), would address the 
shortage of affordable rental homes for people with the lowest 
incomes through a robust investment of nearly $45 billion 
annually in the national Housing Trust Fund. The bill also 
includes resources to repair public housing, build or 
rehabilitate housing in tribal and Native Hawaiian communities, 
and create and preserve affordable homes in rural areas.
    The ``Inflation Reduction Act of 2022'' excludes vital 
affordable housing investments needed to address skyrocketing 
rents and the severe shortage of affordable, accessible rental 
homes available to the lowest-income renters. The House 
previously passed the ``Build Back Better Act'', which included 
$150 billion in targeted affordable housing investments to 
bridge the widening gap between incomes and rising housing 
costs and address the severe lack of deeply affordable, 
accessible rental homes. By leaving the act's historic 
affordable housing investments out of the reconciliation 
package, Congress has missed a once-in-a-generation opportunity 
to address homelessness and housing poverty in the United 
States.
    The new guidance released by the U.S. Department of 
Treasury will increase the ability of State, local, and tribal 
governments to use State and Local Fiscal Recovery Funds 
(SLFRF) to develop affordable housing and help lower housing 
costs. NLIHC has been tracking the use of SLFRF for affordable 
housing and homelessness prevention and services. As of May 
2022, 55 of the 112 jurisdictions in our sample had allocated 
more than $13.7 billion for housing activities. NLIHC has 
weighed in on Treasury's SLFRF guidance and urged the 
Administration to issue clear guidance on how communities can 
use SLFRF to meet the housing needs of people with the lowest 
incomes. The updated guidance and ``Affordable Housing How-To 
Guide'' released by Treasury and the Department of Housing and 
Urban Development will help State and local governments use 
SLFRF to invest in affordable housing.

Q.2. And what more we can do here?

A.2. As the U.S. faces record rent increases and rising 
evictions, it is more important than ever that Congress 
increase investments in long-term solutions to the underlying 
shortage of affordable, accessible homes and improve renter 
protections for the lowest-income people.
    Only through a combination of administrative action and 
robust Federal funding can the country truly resolve its 
affordable housing crisis.
    A stronger housing safety net is needed to prevent 
evictions and homelessness and to reduce housing instability 
among the lowest-income renters. Addressing the roots of the 
housing affordability problem requires a sustained commitment 
to (1) bridging the gap between incomes and rent through 
universal rental assistance, (2) investing in new affordable 
housing and preserving affordable rental homes that already 
exist for America's lowest-income and most marginalized 
renters, (3) providing emergency assistance to stabilize 
renters when they experience financial shocks, and (4) 
establishing and enforcing strong renter protections.
    NLIHC looks forward to a continued partnership with members 
of Congress and the Administration in advancing the large-scale 
investments and antiracist reforms needed to repair the gaping 
holes in our country's social safety net and ensure that every 
renter has an affordable place to call home.

                             [all]