Housing

By Katie Zager Chamberofcommerce.org, a business-minded website recently published an article outlining the cities with the most “House Poor” Homeowners. They define “house poor” as synonymous with “cost burdened,” using the 30% rule. That is: a household is considered cost-burdened if they spend more than 30% of their income on housing and housing-related expenses, such […]

By Jenny Hutchison, Ph.D.
Finding stable housing can be one of the greatest challenges for young people transitioning from foster care to young adulthood. What happens next can affect their economic mobility journey, as well as community wellbeing. But what’s the case for Mecklenburg County?

By Bridget Anderson and Mary Ann Priester, Ph.D.
This article reflects on the enduring partnership between the Charlotte Urban Institute and Mecklenburg County Community Support Services, which together, recently marked 10 years of advancing data-driven efforts to address housing instability and homelessness. As the formal project partnership comes to a close, this milestone offers an opportunity to look back on the impact of our shared work, the foundation it leaves for future progress, and the questions we must continue to ask ourselves to ensure data translates into action in people’s lives […]

By Eric Moore, Ph.D.
Over the past year, we’ve gone deep into the world of corporate landlords and their growing footprint in Mecklenburg County. And we now have a new method to track these elusive entities, uncovering approximately 145 corporate investors who own at least 15 single-family homes each.
It turns out these investors control nearly 7.5% of all single-family homes in the county, far more than you might expect. But this is just the beginning. In the third and final installment of the “Understanding corporate landlords” series, we explore the changing landscape of corporate home ownership […]

By Eric Moore, Ph.D.
Identifying corporate landlords, sometimes referred to as real estate investment trusts (REITs) or institutional investors, can be a complicated process. They can also have dozens of subsidiaries with unique names that mask the actual size of their portfolio. 

So, how can we differentiate between “independent operations”, individuals who own one or two properties often under Limited Liability Companies (LLCs), mom-and-pop investors, those who own between three and nine properties, and the more large-scale operations of corporate landlords? […]