Bexar County evictions are still above pre-pandemic levels
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More than 24,000 eviction cases were filed in Bexar County last year, and the number of households evicted continued to rise above pre-pandemic levels, local data shows.
Why it matters: Sweeping protections helped keep more San Antonians in their homes during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, but with those measures now gone, residents are facing higher levels of displacement.
The latest: Texas Housers, a statewide nonprofit supporting affordable housing, last week released a new data dashboard on Bexar County eviction filings in 2023.
- The nonprofit receives the information from Bexar County through the Texas Public Information Act.
- "The first step to addressing a problem is understanding it," Erin Hahn, a San Antonio-based research analyst with Texas Housers, tells Axios.
State of play: The Texas Housers dashboard shows that landlords filed 24,533 eviction cases in Bexar County in 2023.
- It shows 30 "high evicting properties" that filed about 12% of the county's 2023 eviction cases.
By the numbers: A city dashboard compiling county data shows that those cases resulted in 14,434 eviction judgments last year, meaning the household was actually evicted after the case was filed.
- In 2019, 13,189 households were evicted in Bexar County.
- Eviction judgments were as low as 8,445 in 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic, when there was a federal moratorium on evictions and additional financial aid for tenants.
How it works: Texas Housers chose to compile eviction filings, not just actual evictions, because the filing alone can hurt a renter, Hahn says.
What they're saying: "It's essentially a black mark on their record," she says. Even if a case is dismissed, "that can negatively impact their housing stability in the future, because landlords will see it on their record when they're applying for a new unit."
Context: The U.S. Supreme Court ruled to end a federal moratorium on evictions in August 2021.
- Statewide, the Texas Rent Relief Program and the Texas Eviction Diversion Program launched in February 2021. Both closed in summer 2023.
- The city launched an emergency rental assistance program in April 2020 and maintained it throughout much of the pandemic with the help of federal relief money. It assisted more than 42,000 households in a little over a year.
- A city program is still running, but on a smaller scale — the most recent annual budget includes funds to help 1,483 units or families.
Zoom in: Areas on the Northwest Side around Leon Valley have some of the highest eviction rates, in addition to being home to some of Bexar County's most evicting properties, the Texas Housers dashboard shows.
- In one Leon Valley Census tract, 73% of renter households had an eviction filed against them in 2023. That's 163 filings.
Zoom out: National research shows larger, out-of-town owners are more likely to evict than "mom-and-pop" landlords.
- That's because owners from elsewhere are more likely to own properties in gentrifying areas and raise the rents, Hahn says.
The big picture: Hahn says there's still not enough affordable housing in San Antonio for everyone who needs it.
- When people can't find a monthly rent that's affordable for their income, they're more likely to put a higher percentage of their income toward rent — and that leads to more evictions, Hahn says.
The bottom line: "It just takes one medical bill or one emergency that puts a tenant … behind on rent and susceptible to being evicted," Hahn says.