Massachusetts Has a Huge Waitlist for State-Funded Housing. So Why Are 2,300 Units Vacant?
Massachusetts Has a Huge Waitlist for State-Funded Housing. So Why Are 2,300 Units Vacant?
Families are stuck in shelters or sleeping in their cars while a flawed state selection process and meager funding for renovations leave apartments empty for years.
While this program doesn’t relate to my situation, I did just move to the Boston area, and know first hand how shitty the rental market is here. I’m not even talking about the overall monthly rents you need to fork over (which is insane), I’m talking about brokers fees when signing a lease. It seems like 90% of the places for rent require first + last months rent, security deposit, AND a brokers fee equaling one months rent. Sure, you can use a broker yourself, so it would make sense that you would pay them for their services, but the landlords are the ones using them, and passing the fees on to the renter.
Coming from the western US, this was shocking. No wonder so many people are at risk of losing their housing - they can’t even afford to move to a better situation.
I almost fell for that on Long Island several years ago. To even think that brokers are even necessary with tools like apartments.com is ridiculous.
A while ago me and my now wife moved out of the country for her studies. We didn't live together at the time so I was hesitant about selling my place. I also didn't want to travel all the way back for showings, maintenance or whatever. So I used a broker/realtor.
And I'm glad I did, as the last people who lived there just stopped paying rent. That economic burden fell on the realtor. They didn't treat my place nicely, and that was my cost to fix. But I still would have been in a difficult situation with potential squatters who refused to pay rent if it weren't for them.
I agree that it's more often than not pointless, but I was lucky to use them.
If Massachusetts was serious about housing reform they'd legislate away the broker's fees. But they aren't, so they won't.
they won't. broker industry is in the pockets of beacon Hill and the suits like how they somehow managed to inflate the cost of their house that's located in an arctic tundra of a state
I'm also on this boat also. moved here from the West Coast and feel completely scammed here in Boston. it's actually insane too because most of the people here have bought into the completely corrupt politics that have caused the housing market to get to this place. if you ask people here, most will say they prefer Boston housing because of "tenant protections" and that brokers provide an essential service in such an impacted housing market. those guys are fuckin donkeys. the Boston housing market exists on the backs of students who cycle through apartments at a huge rate every year, and the broker industry makes a killing abusing poor college students into paying brokers fees when they move every year. every industry involved in the Boston housing market is in cahoots with this system. they're all criminals in my view. that on top of the fact a broker came into my apartment without permission to show my apartment and walked into my bathroom while I was showering. I was full nude and the dude waved at me and proceeded to show my bathroom to his clients on clients with me naked in the bathroom. criminals.
From someone who’s been here for over a decade: it’s a paywall, pure and simple.
From Boston to Worcester it is insane. Police are starting to chase away homeless and destroy their camps. It is like They Live out there. I feel like Mass is one bad day from riots.
I used to live in Boston and only once did I find an apartment where I didn't have to pay a last month of rent up front. The rental market there is very much predatory upon the droves of college students and other young people who don't know any different or better. And for those who do know different, they basically have no choice.
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I’ve never hear of a broker’s fee for rentals. That is a thing?
I have had to deal with non-refundable application fees, however. I have gone to war over those fees.
Our investigation found that one cause of the prolonged vacancies is the flawed online waitlist system the state rolled out four years ago. Massachusetts replaced town-by-town waitlists with a single pool of applicants that 230 local housing agencies draw from. But the state failed to implement an efficient system for selecting potential tenants. Understaffed and underfunded local agencies have to screen applicants for income, criminal background and other eligibility criteria. Apartments are left in limbo as some candidates turn out not to qualify. Applicants often indicate they would accept housing in many towns, but then reject offers from communities that are far away from their current location.
Deb Libby, a Worcester grandmother with pancreatic cancer, has been on the waitlist for state-funded housing for almost a year. Credit: Jesse Costa/WBUR “I think it’s the most horrible, horrible, inefficient program,” said David Hedison, executive director at the housing authority in Chelmsford, a town 30 miles northwest of Boston. He said the agency spent six months contacting 500 people who were on the waitlist for a three-bedroom apartment, before it finally found one who responded and qualified for the unit. “The whole sense of helping residents in your community is gone,” he said.
Horrible inefficiencies and a terrible process. Good journalism and some terrible governance.
Chelmsford has a housing authority? When I lived there nearly 30yrs ago biggest thing there was a strip mall that had a restaurant, video rental, barber/salon and a convenience store.
So basically the state has been ignoring the need to get funding for maintaining the units (a lot have been condemned) and to get additional staffing to screen applicants
Mass made a switch from local housing authorities having their own application system to a statewide online version. Ideally it sounds good, however there weren’t enough people to screen through the apps fast enough. And like online job apps, there is a way to “game the system” and loads of people would mark their interest in living everywhere, but would rather live in only one area
Basically a half-baked solution that the state fails to correct despite the 5-10 years of complaints from those working in the system asking for improvements
Can confirm, I deliver to some apartment buildings that are 55+ Section 8 and out of the 32 apartments 4 are vacant, 3 of which have been for well over a year. The others are folks that have been there for years, but I'm sure if they moved or passed on their old place would have the same fate.
But the towns housing department doesn't have enough people for maintenance, yet they make all this money regardless of occupancy.
The worst part about this is that this is such a fixable problem. The money is there, the political will is there, they just need some programmers to fix the jank program and a couple of good admins to sort the info.
Hoping the new guy, Augustus, can turn this shit around.