More Americans Now Become Homeless Due to Surge in Rent

February 2, 2024

More Americans now become homeless due to the surge in rent, reports Harvard’s Joint Center for Housing Studies.

A whopping 653,000 people reported experiencing homelessness in January of 2023, up roughly 12% from the same time a year prior and 48% from 2015, according to CNBC.

That marks the largest single-year increase in the country’s unhoused population on record, Harvard researchers said.

Homelessness is a much bigger problem in states such as California and Washington, which has also increased in historically more affordable parts of the country.

Arizona, Ohio, Tennessee, and Texas have seen the largest growths in their unsheltered populations due to rising local housing costs.

The American people are struggling to keep a roof over their heads due to inflation in 2021 and 2022 and a surging rental market across the U.S. outpaced worker salaries.

There are several factors that have caused homelessness.

Researchers found that surging rents and the expiration of pandemic relief last year contributed to the spike in housing insecurity.

Furthermore, there’s been a massive trend of tech companies and financial institutions nationwide laying off their workforce.

“In the first years of the pandemic, renter protections, income supports, and housing assistance helped decrease a considerable rise in homelessness.

These protections ended in 2022, at a time when rents were rising rapidly and increasing numbers of migrants were prohibited from working.

Currently, the number of people experiencing homelessness jumped to 71,000 in just one year,” said a recent report from the United States Census.

What are your thoughts on the current ‘rent crisis’ many American are feeling right now?

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Also Read: SNAP Benefits Will Now Increase For The Year 2024

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A home retailer is now at high risk of bankruptcy after ending the third quarter with $62 million in debt, sources report.

Kirkland’s Home, a specialty retailer of home décor and furnishings operating 338 stores in 35 U.S. states, has found itself in a fight for survival, reports TheStreet.

The home retailer had no other option than to increase its credit availability after the quarter ended.

“To support its strategic repositioning efforts, Kirkland’s Home secured additional debt financing through a new first-in last-out, asset-based, delayed-draw term loan facility.

The new facility is in addition to the company’s existing $90 million asset-based revolving credit facility,” the retailer shared in a press release.

Even with the new loan, Kirkland’s has very little available money, reports TheStreet.

“Proceeds from the new facility, when drawn, will be used to provide additional liquidity for ongoing working capital needs,” according to Kirkland’s.

“As of closing, the company’s combined credit availability under both credit agreements was approximately $21.5 million.”

Kirkland’s Home lost $6.7 million in Q3.

In addition to appearing on Retail Dive’s bankruptcy watch list, Kirkland’s also has a “high default risk,” according to Rapid Ratings.

‘Kirkland’s Inc. is situated in our High-Risk group, displays weakness in five of our seven performance categories, demonstrates significant underperformance in [return on capital employed], and was downgraded in the most recent period,” the site, which uses financial metrics to predict default risk, reported.

“If current trends persist it would be logical to expect that Kirkland’s Inc. will face serious default risk this coming year and will struggle with efficiency and competitiveness problems over the medium term; thus, the outlook is negative.”

The company says it’s on the right path toward returning to profitability.

“The third quarter demonstrated execution of our strategic repositioning as we experienced sequential improvements in traffic and comparable sales each month of the quarter, along with expanded gross margins,” interim Chief Executive Ann Joyce said in the chain’s third-quarter-earnings release.

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Also Read: A Home Improvement Retailer Now Closes All 157 Stores

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