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housing
Trump’s HUD Secretary and Our Reverse Robin Hood Housing System
A Trump-Turner housing agenda appears destined to continue the worst aspects of our nation’s approach to affordable housing: a relentless diversion to the already-wealthy of resources supposedly designated for the housing needs of the poor.
Jan 14, 2025
Donald Trump has nominated former Texas state representative Scott Turner as his secretary of Housing and Urban Development, the $70 billion federal agency that administers rental assistance and public housing programs, enforces fair housing laws, and provides community development grants to local communities.
Other Trump cabinet nominees, like potential Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., have attracted attention for the ways they may shift the traditional priorities of the agencies they would lead. Turner has flown under the radar.
Perhaps that is because dramatic changes to HUD would need congressional approval, which was denied when Trump tried to slash the department during his first administration. Or maybe it is because, in many respects, Turner does not seem inclined to significantly alter U.S. housing policies.
As for likely HUD Secretary Turner, he is most associated with yet another housing giveaway to the rich.
That is not a good thing.
A Trump-Turner housing agenda appears destined to continue the worst aspects of our nation’s approach to affordable housing: a relentless diversion to the already-wealthy of resources supposedly designated for the housing needs of the poor.
This reverse Robin Hood approach to U.S. housing began in the 1970’s, when the Nixon administration and Congress began switching our affordable housing investment away from public housing to subsidizing for-profit landlords. Now, we fund wealthy landlords, often corporate landlords, via direct payments such as the Housing Choice Voucher program and Project-Based Section 8 program, in return for the for-profit landlords temporarily housing low-income tenants. 558F Low-Income Housing Tax Credits are designed to provide a tax shelter for wealthy investors.
This profit-soaked combination costs taxpayers six times more each year than public housing does. But public housing is far more efficient, for the simple reason that it bypasses private profits. Public housing is also hugely successful in providing high-quality, low-cost housing when there is adequate investment in maintenance and upkeep.
That is why other nations, who have far less homelessness, evictions, and housing-insecure people than we do, prioritize public housing. They divert little if any government support to for-profit landlords. And it is why U.S. for-profit landlords have been pushing for generations to block U.S. public housing from the funds it needs to ensure safety and keep up maintenance. The resulting deterioration of U.S. public housing undercuts competition for private landlords and creates a narrative justifying the delivery of housing dollars to the private sector.
A Subsidy for Gentrification
But those privatized programs are deeply flawed. The Low-Income Housing Tax Credit often leads to rents higher than poor families can afford. The program known as LIHTC has been characterized by housing researchers as “a better-than-nothing gimmick that helps the poor by rewarding the rich.” Even that characterization is too generous for some legislators, who call LIHTC “legalized theft of government assets.”
Similarly, project-based Section 8 housing directs government dollars to for-profit landlords as payment for low-income tenants’ rent. But, like LIHTC, the program allows those landlords to convert their buildings to market-rate rentals after they use the government subsidies to pay off their debt on the properties. By contrast, public housing provides affordable housing in perpetuity.
There is even less lasting impact coming from the largest low-income housing program in the country, Housing Choice Vouchers. We provide a full $30 billion per year in voucher payments to landlords, often large corporate landlords, but those landlords can end their involvement at the end of each tenant’s lease, leaving the low-income renter without housing. It is another low-risk high-yield arrangement for the wealthy and raw deal for the poor: little wonder that the Project 2025 blueprint drafted by Trump supporters champions vouchers even as it slams other HUD programs.
As for likely HUD Secretary Turner, he is most associated with yet another housing giveaway to the rich. During Trump’s first administration, Turner served as executive director of the White House Opportunity and Revitalization Council, which focused on promoting opportunity zones, a program created by Trump’s 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act.
The program rewards the wealthy’s investment in economically distressed areas—opportunity zones—with huge tax breaks. But investigations by ProPublica and Congress show that the definition of what areas count as opportunity zones is far too broad, and the guidelines for who benefits from the investments are far too loose. As a result, money invested in expensive hotels, high-rent apartment buildings, and even luxury condominiums as a superyacht marina escapes taxation. Politically connected billionaires lobby for the land where they develop to be designated an opportunity zone, then rake in the benefits.
The Brookings Institution says opportunity zones operate as a subsidy for gentrification. “The direct tax benefits of opportunity zones will flow overwhelmingly to wealthy investors,” the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities says. “But the tax break might not do much to help low-income communities, and it could even harm some current residents of such communities.”
So, despite the relative quiet around Scott Turner’s nomination, we know some important things about him. We know that he champions opportunity zones as an addition to the already abundant tax benefits the U.S. showers on landlords and real estate investors. And we know that he is a fierce critic of anti-poverty programs, as he has made multiple public statements about government assistance being harmful and even disastrous.
But we also know that the likely next HUD secretary is concerned about that alleged harm only when assistance is provided to the poor. The wealthy can count on Trump and Turner to keep the pipeline of government housing money wide open and flowing their way.
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Advocates Demand Eviction Moratorium, Rent Freeze as LA Landlords 'Cash in on Crisis'
"Greedy landlords shouldn't profit from human tragedy," argued one housing defender. "Put people over profits for once!"
Jan 12, 2025
With some Los Angeles-area landlords jacking up rental listing prices by 50% or more as historic wildfires rage, housing advocates in the nation's second-largest city are calling for an immediate eviction moratorium and rent freeze.
As California authorities have noted in recent days, state Penal Code Section 396 prohibits taking "unfair advantage" of consumers during times of emergency or disaster. Landlords cannot raise rent by more than 10% of the price immediately prior to the emergency. Democratic California Gov. Gavin Newsom declared a state of emergency last Tuesday.
"If you're a renter who has been impacted by the fires, remember that you have rights!"
"It's called price gouging," California Attorney General Rob Bonta, also a Democrat, said during a Saturday news conference. "It is illegal. You cannot do it. It is a crime punishable by up to a year in jail and fines."
That isn't stopping some landlords from trying to profit from the deadly wildfires. Tenant rights advocate Chelsea Kirk—the director of policy and advocacy at the L.A.-based Strategic Actions for a Just Economy—has created an open database of more than 100 Zillow listings in which landlords have raised asking prices for rents by more than the legal limit, and in some cases by over 50 or even 75% or more.
Activists said there are two related things officials can do right now to mitigate the disaster's impact on renters.
"We need a rent freeze and eviction moratorium," the anti-capitalist collective People's City Council—Los Angeles said on social media.
NOlympics LA said, "L.A. City Council needs to implement a rent freeze NOW."
"Price gouging in the wake of disaster is unacceptable, this is simple and could be done immediately but will L.A. leaders even propose it?" the group added. "We need an eviction moratorium to stop landlords [from] evicting people to cash in on crisis."
Temporary eviction moratoriums and rent freezes were implemented at the national, state, and local level during the Covid-19 pandemic. While California's moratorium did not protect everyone from eviction, with thousands of renters removed from their homes under various exceptions, evictions plummeted thanks to the policy. However, by 2023 eviction rates had returned to—or surpassed—pre-pandemic levels.
The L.A. Tenants Union noted that "in the midst of all this destruction, eviction courts are still churning."
"The 6th floor of the downtown courthouse is packed today," the group added. "We demand an emergency eviction moratorium and a rent freeze."
If you’re a renter who has been impacted by the fires, remember that you have rights! Resources for renters below:
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— Ground Game LA (@groundgamela.bsky.social) January 9, 2025 at 4:35 PM
With thousands of Los Angeles area families now unhoused due to the fires, desperate victims are vulnerable to these unscrupulous landlords and real estate agents. Kirk wants them to know—and exercise—their rights.
"Because California is currently under an emergency declaration, rental price gouging is illegal," she told Common Dreams. "If you see a rental listing with a significant price increase—such as more than 10% over the pre-emergency price—you should report it to the attorney general's office immediately, and confront the landlord or agent about it, if you feel comfortable doing so."
Kirk continued:
That said, I recognize this is an incredibly vulnerable time, especially for people who have lost their homes and are urgently trying to secure housing. Confronting a landlord may feel risky and might compromise your chances of getting the place. But it's crucial to remember you have rights, even if you've already signed a lease. If you realize after signing that the landlord engaged in price gouging, don't hesitate to push back. There are groups actively working to ensure these laws are enforced and to support tenants in these situations.
Bonta offered similar advice: "If you know someone who's been a victim of price gauging please report it."
As for the landlords and agents trying to capitalize on disaster victims, Kirk said that "their actions are not only illegal but profoundly shameful."
"The community sees what they are doing, and we will hold them accountable," she told Common Dreams. "While I do not have much faith that officials will penalize landlords, we—the tenants and community organizers—will not sit idly by. We will take action, whether through organizing, direct action, or other means, to expose and stop these exploitative practices. Renters deserve to be treated with dignity, especially during times of crisis."
Bonta noted how new technology is being utilized to determine prices, and it's not just landlords and their agents using it.
"Some of our hotels and some of our landlords use algorithms based on demand and supply to set their prices," the attorney general said. "If those prices lead to prices higher than before the emergency by 10% that's against the law."
"If you're a mom and pop and you're not aware of these laws now you are aware," Bonta added. "Ignorance is not an excuse."
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Biden DOJ Sues Major Landlords Over Algorithmic Price Fixing
"If you mess with the price of rent, be prepared to meet the DOJ on the other side of that scheme!" wrote the American Economic Liberties Project.
Jan 07, 2025
The U.S.Justice Department on Tuesday announced that it has added six landlords as defendants in an antitrust lawsuit that the agency initially filed against the real estate software company RealPage, which the DOJ accused of engaging in a price fixing scheme that allows reduced competition between landlords so they can increase rents.
At the center of the case is RealPage's "algorithmic pricing software," which generates rent price recommendations using software based on their and their rivals' "competitively sensitive information," which they submit to RealPage, according to an August statement from the Department of Justice regarding the initial complaint.
The new complaint alleges that the six companies—Greystar Real Estate Partners LLC; Blackstone's LivCor LLC; Camden Property Trust; Cushman & Wakefield Inc and Pinnacle Property Management Services LLC; Willow Bridge Property Company LLC; and Cortland Management LLC—"participated in an unlawful scheme to decrease competition among landlords in apartment pricing, harming millions of American renters," according to a Tuesday statement from the Department of Justice.
The landlords collectively operate more than 1.3 million units in 43 states and the District of Columbia, according to the agency.
The Department of Justice alleges that in addition to using RealPages's "anticompetitive pricing algorithms," the companies coordinated in a number of ways, including "communicating with competitors' senior managers about rents, occupancy, and other competitively sensitive topics" and participating in "user groups" hosted by RealPage, during which landlords would discuss, for example, how to modify the software's pricing methodology and the companies' own pricing strategies.
"While Americans across the country struggled to afford housing, the landlords named in today's lawsuit shared sensitive information about rental prices and used algorithms to coordinate to keep the price of rent high," said Doha Mekki, acting assistant attorney general for the Justice Department's Antitrust Division, in the Tuesday statement.
Two states, Illinois and Massachusetts, have also joined the suit as plaintiffs.
The American Economic Liberties Project, a group that urges government to confront corporate concentration, touted the updates to the lawsuit, writing Tuesday, "If you mess with the price of rent, be prepared to meet the DOJ on the other side of that scheme!"
Tony Carrk, executive director of the watchdog Accountable.US, said in a Tuesday statement that "corporate landlords like Camden Property Trust, one of the landlord companies included in today's complaint, have reaped hundreds of millions in profits while using RealPage's algorithm, and that's just the tip of the iceberg."
According to the Tuesday release from the Department of Justice, pending a consent decree which must be approved by the court, the DOJ may resolve its claims against one of the landlords, Cortland, which would then cooperate with the Justice Department's investigation and litigation.
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