Published on January 28, 2020
Evictions due to lack of affordable housing and rising rent costs contribute to the homelessness crisis. A new interactive map by graduate student Alex Ramiller with the UW Department of Geography builds on the study released in 2018 that measured and analyzed the issue of evictions in western Washington using court records, census data and housing market trends.
Between 2013 and 2017, 1 in 55 (1.8%) Washingtonian adults faced an eviction, according to UW. According to UW, nine neighborhoods in Pierce County and eight neighborhoods in Snohomish County had the highest estimated relative risk of eviction, with relative risks ranging between 3% and 6.78%. The UW study also found a huge racial disparity of African American adults who faced eviction filings. When comparing the court records for three counties to their respective 2012 to 2017 adult population, UW found that 9% of black adults in King County and 17% of black adults in Pierce faced an eviction within a five-year period.
Research shows that low-income households are most likely to be evicted where stagnant wages and inadequate welfare are unable to compete with increases in rent, according to UW. According to UW, 80% to 90% of evictions are due to falling behind on rent where over 1/3rd of the defendants in the study were contributing over 80% of their income to rent.
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Originally written by Brittany Perry for King 5 News.