Shelterforce, December 16, The Foreclosure Crisis Waiting for Us in January
Although homeowners have so far accessed financial relief from the pandemic much more easily than renters, housing counselors are bracing for a foreclosure crisis as forbearance terms start to end.
When foreclosures are set in motion next year, there’s no doubt that they will hit vulnerable populations like the elderly and Black and Brown homeowners harder. The crisis will also have a real impact on small landlords, according to Ibijoke Akinbowale, director of the Housing Counseling Network at the National Community Reinvestment Coalition, who says that the pathway for recovery for small landlords and renters is not as clear.
“Right now, we’re in a rental crisis, and that rental crisis has a significant impact on homeownership,” explains Akinbowale. “You’ve got small landlords who represent a significant portion of the affordable housing stock that we have in this country, [and] they sit in the same boat as renters [in] not having national solutions that cover them.”
