Landlords pumped billions into apartment buildings during the pandemic. That bet could now go horribly wrong.

Yahoo Finance ^ | 4/26/23 | Daniel Geiger

[KevinB]

I work closely with a company that owns apartment buildings. I have access to the financials. It’s like printing money

[spintreebob]

I rented from a large landlord, thousands of units in metro Atlanta,tens of thousands nationwide. They had the same payment ratio during covid as pre-covid. The same people who are conscientious are conscientious regardless.

The same people who say “the dog ate the rent” are the same people who blame covid.

Many years ago I was landlord of apartments in Chicago. The working poor and the welfare had exactly the same income. The working poor always paid the rent. Never lost a dime on them. The welfare poor (with a few exceptions) always fell behind and never cought up.

[linMcHlp]

bkmk

[mass55th]

I’ve never owned a piece of property in all my 75 years. Always rented, always had a job to pay my rent each month. I’ve lived here about 23 years. I have a two bedroom, one bath apartment, galley-style kitchen, large dining area, large living room, walk-in closet in my bedroom and in the hallway, small food pantry in the same hallway, and a double closet with sliding doors in the 2nd bedroom, storage area in the basement, dish washer, garbage disposal, central air conditioning. I pay my own utilities. Garbage and water are included. If I told you what my rent was, you’d think I lived in the slums. The landlord just takes care of their long-term, elderly tenants. Most of the time if they have to raise the rent, they limit it to 5 or 10 bucks. They’ll have to carry me out of here.

[Jim Noble]

Big money investors pumped billions into buying up apartment buildings in the pandemic era. The deals were often based on the assumption that rents would continue to increase. But rents are flatlining and expenses are increasing, leaving landlords to face big losses.

Too bad, so sad.