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States and localities have only distributed 11% of the tens of billions of dollars in federal rental assistance, the Treasury Department said yesterday, the latest sign the program is struggling to reach the millions of tenants at risk of eviction, the Associated Press reported. The latest data shows that the pace of distribution increased in July over June and that nearly a million households have been helped. But with the Supreme Court considering a challenge to the federal eviction moratorium, the concern is that a wave of evictions will happen before much of the assistance has been distributed. Some 3.5 million people in the U.S. as of Aug. 16 said they face eviction in the next two months, according to the U.S. Census Bureau’s Household Pulse Survey. Lawmakers approved $46.5 billion in rental assistance earlier this year and most states are distributing the first tranche of $25 billion. According to the Treasury Department, $5.1 billion in Emergency Rental Assistance has been distributed by states and localities through July, up from $3 billion at the end of June and only $1.5 billion by May 31. Several states, including Virginia and Texas, have been praised for moving quickly to get the federal money out. But many others have still only distributed a small percentage of the rental help.

An investigation by The Markup has found that lenders in 2019 were more likely to deny home loans to people of color than to white people with similar financial characteristics — even when we controlled for newly available financial factors the mortgage industry for years has said would explain racial disparities in lending, the Associated Press reported. Holding 17 different factors steady in a complex statistical analysis of more than 2 million conventional mortgage applications for home purchases, we found that lenders were 40% more likely to turn down Latino applicants for loans, 50% more likely to deny Asian/Pacific Islander applicants, and 70% more likely to deny Native American applicants than similar white applicants. Lenders were 80% more likely to reject Black applicants than similar white applicants. These are national rates. In every case, the prospective borrowers of color looked almost exactly the same on paper as the white applicants, except for their race. The industry had criticized previous similar analyses for not including financial factors they said would explain disparities in lending rates but were not public at the time: debts as a percentage of income, how much of the property’s assessed worth the person is asking to borrow, and the applicant’s credit score.

Sales of new homes rose a modest 1% in July after a string of declines as new home prices soar to record levels, the Associated Press reported. Sales last month reached a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 708,000, the Commerce Department reported Tuesday. Sales had fallen in April, May and June as builders confronted surging lumber prices and a shortage of workers. Home prices continue their upward trajectory to new heights. The median price of a new home sold in July climbed to an unprecedented $390,500, up 18.4% from a year ago, while the average sales price in July hit a record $446,000, up 17.6% from a year ago. Even with the small sales gain in July, new home sales are 27.2% below the pace of a year ago. Sales peaked at a rate of 993,000 units in January but have cooled since then, though remain at historically high levels.

President Joe Biden's administration yesterday asked the U.S. Supreme Court to leave in place a COVID-19 pandemic-related federal ban on residential evictions while the justices consider a challenge by landlord groups to the ban's legality, Reuters reported. In a court filing, U.S. Justice Department lawyers said the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) acted within its lawful authority this month when it renewed the moratorium through Oct. 3 after it had lapsed at the end of July. Groups representing landlords have sought to lift the moratorium, pointing out that even Biden administration officials have conceded it may not be lawful. The CDC first issued an eviction moratorium in September 2020, with agency officials saying the policy was needed to combat the spread of COVID-19 and prevent homelessness during the pandemic. Realtor groups in Alabama and Georgia were among those challenging the moratorium. Under heavy political pressure from Biden's fellow Democrats, his administration on Aug. 3 issued a slightly narrower eviction moratorium three days after the prior one expired. Biden initially had said that congressional action was needed to renew the moratorium, but his administration reversed course. The current moratorium, due to expire in October, covers nearly 92% of U.S. counties, but that could change based on COVID-19 conditions.

Most evictions for unpaid rent have been halted since the early days of the pandemic and there are now more than 15 million people living in households that owe as much as $20 billion in back rent, according to the Aspen Institute, the Associated Press reported. A majority of single-family rental home owners have been impacted, according to a survey from the National Rental Home Council, and 50% say they have tenants who have missed rent during the pandemic. Smaller landlords with fewer than four units, who often don’t have the financing of larger property owners, were hit especially hard, with as many as 58% having tenants behind on rent, according to the National Association of Realtors. More than half of back rent is owed to smaller landlords. Many landlords are saddled with tens of thousands of dollars in lost rent — money that was meant for retirement, a college fund or for their investors, who themselves had sought a safe investment. They are maxing out credit cards or dipping into savings to pay property taxes, staff salaries, insurance, water bills and maintenance. Landlords, big and small, are most angry about the moratoriums, which they consider illegal. Many believe some tenants could have paid rent, if not for the moratorium. And the $47 billion in federal rental assistance that was supposed to make landlords whole has been slow to materialize. By July, only $3 billion of the first tranche of $25 billion had been distributed. Many landlords are saddled with tens of thousands of dollars in lost rent — money that was meant for retirement, a college fund or for their investors, who themselves had sought a safe investment. They are maxing out credit cards or dipping into savings to pay property taxes, staff salaries, insurance, water bills and maintenance.

New home construction fell 7 percent in July as builders tackled massive backlogs over newer contracts, according to data released yesterday by the Commerce Department, The Hill reported. Housing starts for privately owned homes hit a seasonally adjusted annualized rate of 1.53 million in July, falling below the revised June rate of 1.65 million while remaining 2.5 percent above the same month last year. Single-family housing starts were down 4.5 percent, and starts on homes with five or more units plunged 13.6 percent. Home sales and construction have fallen steadily throughout the summer after surging lumber prices earlier in the year drastically increased the cost of building homes. While lumber prices have fallen closer to historic levels, home prices have continued to break record highs as builders fight through other supply issues and backlogs.