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Rebecca Cowin

Contributing Author

Rebecca Cowin is a contributing author and former employee of the Federal Reserve bank of Cleveland.

    • Community Development Reports

      • Community Development Reports
        Measuring Evictions during the COVID-19 Crisis
        Rebecca Cowin Hal Martin Clare Stevens
        07.17.2020
        Evictions are a serious risk for households facing job loss and economic upheaval during the COVID-19 pandemic, and temporary policies put in place to protect renters are beginning to expire. To understand how the crisis is affecting evictions, we measured eviction filing activity across 44 cities and counties. As of July 7, 2020, eviction filings have almost returned to their prepandemic levels in places where local bans have expired or where they were never enacted. We find that eviction filings tend to surge after temporary policies expire much more in places that enacted both filing bans and hearing bans than those that enacted just hearing bans while allowing filings to continue. As federal stimulus supplements for the unemployed expire, evictions are likely to increase for households that have lost work because of the crisis unless there is material improvement in the economy (Mervosh 2020).

        Topics: Public health crises, Affordable housing