What Governments are Doing to Answer the Rent Payment Crisis

As Americans wait for their stimulus checks to alleviate some of the financial burden caused by furloughs, layoffs, and hour cuts, rent an mortgages are some of the largest, if not the largest bills the average American faces every month. 

The National Multifamily Housing Council has gathered data from 13.4 million rental apartments. The Council received help from other real estate data companies, including Entrata, RealPage, and Yardi. The data showed that almost a third of US apartment renters were not able to pay their April rent during the first week of the month. In fact, only 69% of tenants paid any percentage of their rent between April 1st and the 5th. 

To answer the call, the federal government has allowed apartment building owners with government-assisted mortgages to defer their payments. The Federal Reserve agreed to buy up bonds tied to certain multifamily loans, as well.

In the UK, things are looking quite the same. The government has extended the three-month payment deferment for mortgage borrowers to tenants and buy-to-let landlords. During this time, no one can be evicted from their home of repossessed.

As for paying back the landlords after the market stabilizes again, that is being left up to the individual businesses to work out with their own tenants. 

In Spain, President Pedro Sánchez is working on an agreement to extend the State-of-Alarm for another 15 days.

For tenants, landlords, and owners, this means:

• The suspension of two extendable months of rent payments
• Gradual financial compensation
• Payments on home rentals to be extended in the case of freelancers and SMEs
• Automatic extension of three months for leases ending during the State-of-Alarm period
• Rent abuse prevention in the six months following the State-of-Alarm period

The extensions and orders put in place to protect those most affected financially by the Coronavirus pandemic, are just a drop in the bucket when it comes to the crisis gripping the rental market. In the US, the measures have yet to cover loans held by banks, something that government will have to address sooner, rather than later.