Washington, DC - The actions taken today by HUD Secretary Ben Carson and Federal Housing Finance Agency Director Mark Calabria are important first steps to ensuring that renters and homeowners are able to keep a roof over their heads during the coronavirus pandemic. By extending a moratorium on foreclosures to homeowners with loans covered by FHA, Fannie Mae, and Freddie Mac, and encouraging Public Housing Authorities (PHAs) to suspend evictions for public housing residents, we can help prevent households from losing their homes during this public health emergency. But far more is needed to protect the people who are at the greatest risk of evictions and homelessness – America’s lowest-income renters who were already struggling to pay rent and make ends meet before this latest disaster, and people experiencing homelessness. Congress must implement a national moratorium on all evictions and foreclosures, as well as fund rental assistance and grants to homeless service providers and outreach workers to get people quickly and affordably housed. Now more than ever, housing is health care.
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About NLIHC: Established in 1974 by Cushing N. Dolbeare, the National Low Income Housing Coalition is dedicated solely to achieving socially just public policy that ensure people with the lowest income in the United States have affordable and decent homes.