Triangle rent payments are being made at near-usual levels, despite pandemic
The coronavirus pandemic has pushed many North Carolinians into economic turmoil — nearly 1 million have filed for unemployment benefits since March — and yet almost nine out of 10 renters in Raleigh and Durham still managed to pay their May rent on time.
In fact, the number of renters in the county who paid rent from May 1-6 was only one percentage point less than a year ago.
In March, advocates and attorneys had worries for the Triangle area and whether people would be able to make their April rent.
Raleigh has more than 80,000 food and retail workers, many of whom lost their jobs, at least temporarily, when businesses were forced to close by stay-at-home orders. The city also has the 53rd most expensive rent in America according to a Zumper report.
“All of us are figuring out how many people won’t be able to pay their rent and we’re just scrambling to try to help,” Kim Westermann, communications manager at CASA, which provides housing to homeless people or those at risk, said in an interview with The News & Observer in March.
Peter Gilbert from Legal Aid told the N&O then that even if courts were not hearing eviction cases at the time, there would be a wave of them when cases resume.
“I do expect we will have a large number of eviction cases in the next few months,” he said.
Rent payments have climbed since April drop
But in the first week of May, data from RealPage’s rent payment tracker showed more than 86% of Raleigh and Durham metro renters paid their rent. In May 2019, it was 87%.
Those numbers are up significantly from the first week of last month.
In the first week of April, RealPage’s data showed around 79% renters in Raleigh and Cary were meeting their rent obligations. By the second week of April, the number who had paid increased to 83.4%.
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The increase in payments in the Triangle tracks with what is being reported across the country. According to the National Multifamily Housing Council’s tracker, the number of American households that paid rent went up from 85% in April to 87.7% in May.
“Once again, despite the economic and health challenges facing so many, we have found that apartment residents who live in professionally managed properties are meeting their obligations,” said Doug Bibby, NMHC president, in a press release.
Bibby noted in the press release that the statistics don’t capture households who rent from small landlords or subsidized properties, which would be most likely to be experiencing financial problems during the pandemic.
‘Is June the month where it finally drops?’
Dustin Engelken, government affairs director for the Triangle Apartment Association, said while the rent payment tracker reports don’t include the smaller landlords that are members the association, the numbers are generally accurate for what he’s seen in the area.
From conversations he’s had with small landlords, he said they are just a few percentage points behind large complexes.
However, Raleigh has nearly 150,000 rental units, including many student housing apartments, and Engelken said even 5% more households not paying is a large number.
“It doesn’t give a full picture of rent situation,” Engelken said. “That being said when I’m talking to my members, generally things are doing OK.”
He said rental property owners thought April would be worse than it was. Then, when May came along they thought, “Surely May will look bad. And again we’ve been a little bit surprised.”
Engelken said no one has landed on a reason that the extent of rent payment problems hasn’t been as bad as expected.
“We’ve been having that conversation and we’re not really sure,” he said. “But, you know, it’s part unemployment, it’s part the stimulus plan, it’s part savings, families and friends, credit cards.”
However, he was excited on Monday when Wake County commissioners voted to use millions from the $194 million it received from the federal CARES Act for rental assistance in its new House Wake! program.
“Now of course the attention shifts,” Engelken said. “Is June the month where it finally drops?”
This story was originally published May 22, 2020 at 5:30 AM.
