New Research Shows that Women are Disproportionately Vulnerable to Eviction

The New York Times reports:

New research is showing that eviction is a particular burden on low-income black women, often single mothers, who have an easier time renting apartments than their male counterparts, but are vulnerable to losing them because their wages or public benefits have not kept up with the cost of housing.

This will come as no surprise to those that have been following the ways in which this economic down turn has exacerbated many of the financial threats facing so many women and people of color, in particular. Just as corrupt mortgage companies have targeted low-income women, well-documented in places like Baltimore, women are now losing their rented housing at higher rates than men.
This new study focuses on Milwaukee, Wisconsin, where one of every 25 renter-occupied households in the city is evicted each year. In black neighborhoods, the rate is one in 14. Women from largely black neighborhoods in Milwaukee constitute 13 percent of the city’s population, but 40 percent of those evicted.
But this isn’t just a problem of the Midwest or of former industry towns like Milwaukee, straining for rejuvenation in tough times. According to the NYT: “Housing lawyers in Los Angeles and New York described a similar predominance of minority women, including Hispanic women, in eviction cases.” According to Chester Hartman, an urban planner with the Poverty and Race Research Action Council in Washington, there have probably been millions of evictions nationwide in the last year, but unlike with foreclosures, data isn’t easy to come by.
Why are women disproportionately targeted? The study lists a combination of factors, but a few of them are outrageous: “women more readily complain to city agencies about repairs, potentially angering landlords who then find excuses to evict them. And police reports of domestic violence can backfire on women, leading some landlords to seek evictions out of fear that they will be fined for tolerating disturbances.”
See also:
Resisting Foreclosures Together
Domestic violence survivor evicted for reporting abuser
Thanks to John for the heads up.