Wall Street’s Rental Bet Brings Quandary Housing Poor

[xchrom]

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-08-29/wall-street-s-rental-bet-brings-quandary-housing-poor.html

LaTanya Moore-Newsome, a real estate agent with Century 21 in Atlanta, has been calling Wall Street-backed landlords for months on behalf of her low-income clients with government housing vouchers.

She said some of the area’s biggest homebuyers in the past two years, including Blackstone Group LP (BX), American Homes 4 Rent and Silver Bay Realty Trust Corp. (SBY), repeatedly told her they had nothing available for tenants who use subsidies under the federal Section 8 assistance plan. Last week, she finally got a positive response from Blackstone’s Invitation Homes unit, which said it would accept applications from her renters.

“It’s a really uphill battle dealing with these investors,” Moore-Newsome said. “You already have to deal with some of the issues with owners not wanting to take Section 8 in nicer areas. Now you have these big companies come into their neighborhoods and they say we’re not renting to you either.”

Private-equity firms, hedge funds and real estate investment trusts have bought more than 100,000 U.S. homes, becoming dominant single-family landlords in markets hardest-hit by the housing crash such as Atlanta. As the companies seek thousands of tenants to fill newly renovated properties, their decision whether to lease to low-income Americans with Section 8 vouchers stands to affect both their profitability and poor residents who have been longtime renters.

[Jasana]

1. Great story..

but I doubt it'll get much attention today because SYRIA! We're running around worrying and talking about that when we can't even fix our problems at home.

[xchrom]

2. it's not sexy like war is. nt

[Recursion]

3. This wouldn't be a problem if we turned Section 8 into a straight cash subsidy to the renter

It would be replaced with different problems, possibly, but the "waiting forever to find a landlord that accepts it" part would stop being a problem.