After hitting the pause button during the pandemic, the eviction machinery in New York City, one of the world’s most expensive housing markets, will likely soon start firing up again, the New York Times reported. For roughly 16 months, the city’s renters have been shielded from eviction under broad protections imposed by the federal government and New York State to keep people in their homes during the coronavirus outbreak. But those safeguards are soon expected to come to an end, setting off alarms about the fate of struggling tenants who owe months of unpaid rent, cannot make their next payments and could face homelessness. Nearly 500,000 households in New York City have rent arrears that collectively total more than $2.2 billion, according to an analysis of census data by the National Equity Atlas, a research group associated with the University of Southern California. At the same time, the financial challenges facing many tenants are squeezing smaller landlords who rely on rent to pay their own bills. The federal moratorium, enacted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, has been extended several times throughout the pandemic but is now scheduled to expire at the end of July. After an additional one-month extension in June, the agency said that the protections would likely lapse for good this month. But tenants across New York State will have another month of protections under a state eviction moratorium, which expires at the end of August. New York State officials have not given any indication that the moratorium will be extended again, as it has been multiple times during the pandemic. New York State has set aside $2.7 billion in financial aid, largely from the federal government, that tenants can request through an application the state launched in June. If their applications are approved, up to a year’s worth of unpaid rent will be covered, as well as a year’s worth of unpaid utilities. Lower-income tenants can qualify for an additional three months of rental payments. The payments go directly to the landlord.
