Economics

Cheapest Apartments at Biggest Foreclosure Risk as Payments Fall

  • Tenants at no-frills buildings skipping rents at higher rates
  • Landlord defaults would hurt U.S. affordable-housing supply
Photographer: Daniel Acker/Bloomberg
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Covid-19 has exposed a disparity in America’s rental housing that threatens to get even wider.

While landlords at the priciest, amenity-rich apartments have collected most of their rent payments during the pandemic, owners of older, less fancy units -- the backbone of the nation’s affordable housing supply -- haven’t fared as well.