The Southwest Institute for Research on Women has released its most recent update to its report on Housing Insecurity Indicators and Potential Homelessness Estimates for Arizona and Pima County. This report measures current housing insecurity with newer census data, and shares some of the following:
This most recent survey wave contains mixed news:
-
- Unemployment: macroeconomic situation has continued to be unusually positive at both the national and state levels. The unemployment rate in Arizona, 3.4% in May 2024, is a modest decrease relative to 4.2% in January 2024 and remains well-below historical averages.
- Rents: In previous survey waves, collected in February and March of this year, the proportion of non-current renters in Arizona fell to 6.3% in February and 6.7% in March. In the two most recent waves of the Census Household Pulse survey the proportion of non-current renters in Arizona jumped to 10.7% in April and rose further to 11.8% in May. This suggests that the declines observed in February and March were most likely temporary impacts related to tax return season. Once these tax refunds have been spent, we see what appears to be a return to stubbornly high levels of housing insecurity despite historically low unemployment.
- Housing insecurity and evictions: That said, the proportion of these non-current renters viewing eviction in the next two months as “very likely” remained very low at 3.6%. In addition, the accumulation of rental debt has also fallen substantially with 80% of non-current Arizona renters being only 1 month behind on their rent payments (or less). These last two indicators are important qualifiers to the overall percentage of renters not-current, and do suggest that the intensity of housing insecurity, even among non-current renters, has declined substantially relative to previous survey waves.
- Racial disparities: That said, lower-income and BIPOC Arizona households remain disproportionately likely to report being not current on their rent payments and finding it very difficult to meet usual expenses. The National Equity Atlas estimated that 58% of non-current renters in Arizona are POC and 68% are low-income (based on the Census HPS data wave collected Apr 2nd-29th 2024).
- Mortgages: Mortgage holders in Arizona continue to be in a strong, and improving, financial position relative to renters. Only 3.6% reported being not current on mortgage payments (down slightly from 4.1% last wave), and concern about the likelihood of foreclosure is extremely low among these non-current mortgage holders.
- Rent prices: In the fall of 2022 Tucson rent prices began decreasing on average, albeit very modestly. In the Spring of 2023 rent prices in Tucson registered modest upticks in median/average rent prices. Despite these increases, seasonally adjusted metrics of Tucson rent prices increased only 3.5% between April 2023 and April 2024.
- Rental vacancy rate: In addition, there is unambiguous good news in the rental vacancy rate, which has been trending upwards since the end of 2021, and hit an 8-year high in the 1st quarter of 2024. However, countervailing signals worth attention include: 54% of all Arizona respondents reported they had not experienced pressure to move in the last 6 months, 62% of Arizona renters reported an increase in their monthly rent in the last year and 48% reported an increase of $100 or more.
- Eviction filings: The most significant development in this report is that eviction filings have fallen substantially since January and suggest a substantial easing of housing insecurity among Pima County renters. Relative to a peak of 1307 eviction filings in January of 2024, the monthly count of eviction filings has fallen 54.7% to 592 in June. We have not seen the count of eviction filings this low since August of 2021 immediately following the expiration of the eviction moratorium.
- Basic necessities: Other metrics suggest continuing reason for concern: 9% of Arizona households reported reducing or not paying expenses for basic household necessities (such as medicine or food) “almost every month” in the last 12 months to pay an energy bill (65% of households reported “never” being in this situation). Credit card debt balances nationwide and in Arizona have increased 33% between Q4 2022-Q4 2023. And since November of 2023, counts of calls to 211 from Pima County indicate a very substantial increase in calls related to housing and shelter and utilities in recent months.
