COVID-19

On June 30, 2020 Governor Andrew Cuomo signed into law S. 8192B, which prohibits evicting tenants for unpaid rent accrued between March 7 and the compete reopening of their area, so long as a tenant can prove in court that they experience financial hardship during that period.  A judge can still issue a money judgement against the tenant.

On July 1, 2020, HUD published Housing Notice (2020-7), Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act Eviction Moratorium that extends the moratorium on evictions for all HUD-insured or HUD-held mortgages while under forbearance, and also provides guidance on tenant protections for multifamily properties not subject to forbearance and those with HUD-assisted units.

To encourage owners of multifamily properties to provide flexibilities to residents who may be struggling financially as a result of COVID-19, HUD has published a new brochure with updated guidance for multifamily property owners on promoting housing stability during the pandemic.

On June 12 the Bipartsan Policy Center published a new brief entitled “Housing Assistance is a COVID-19 Response and Racial Justice Priority.”  The brief finds that the public health and economic crisis that COVID-19 triggered has put millions of low-income households at risk of eviction and homelessness and has widened racial disparities in housing and health outcomes.

The House of Representatives passed the Emergency Housing Protections and Relief Act of 2020 (H.R. 7301) to provide relief for homeowners, renters, landlords and people experiencing homelessness amidst the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic. The provisions of this bill were largely included in the HEROES Act as passed by the House in May, which has yet to be voted on in the Senate.

To help renters in multifamily properties stay in their homes and to support multifamily property owners during the Coronavirus national emergency, the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) announced that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac (the Enterprises) are allowing servicers to extend forbearance agreements for multifamily property owners with existing forbearance agreements for up to three months.

Oregon Housing and Community Services (OHCS) is distributing $55,000,000 in COVID rental relief funds and $15,000,000 in Energy Assistance to local organizations statewide.

The California Tax Credit Allocation Committee (TCAC) is granting projects with 2018 and 2019 carryover allocations a six-month extension of their respective placed in service deadlines. Projects with a 2018 carryover allocation have a placed in-service deadline of June 30, 2021. Projects with a 2019 carryover allocation have a placed in-service deadline of June 30, 2022.

In response to the COVID-19 pandemic in Connecticut, the Office of the Governor, the Department of Housing, the Connecticut Housing Finance Authority, HUD and other partners conducted a survey of residential landlords.

Earlier today the House Financial Services Committee (HFSC) held a virtual hearing on The Rent Is Still Due: America’s Renters, COVID-19 and an Unprecedented Eviction Crisis. Witnesses Cashauna Hill, Louisiana Fair Housing Action Center; Mike Kingsella, Up for Growth; Ann Oliva, Center on Budget and Policy Priorities and Jenny Schuetz, The Brookings Institution discussed the need for ongoing financial assistance to families.

The HUD Office of Inspector General (OIG) published a report evaluating HUD’s use of agency-wide telework in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. They found telework severely impeded business processes dependent on paper records or facility access; bandwidth constraints with the HUD information technology (IT) infrastructure and the lack of government-furnished equipment for some employees disrupted HUD operations; and respondents reported HUD was generally well-prepared for mandatory telework.

The Arizona Department of Housing (ADOH) issued a procedure to request relief for the placed-in-service deadline for allocations of 2018 and 2019 tax credits. Waiver requests should be sent via email to Jeanne Redondo, Rental Programs administrator at jeanne.redondo@azhousing.gov, and include the following information