The first half of 2023 was the tenant hotline’s busiest half-year ever for new calls, follow-up calls and total calls. We’re on pace to top 20,000 new calls for 2023, a startling number that demonstrates how much Minnesota renters have grown to rely on this service.
Evictions remain the biggest reason for our increased work. This year, we’ve taken 22% more eviction calls than we did through the first half of 2022. This statistic is a bit misleading, as some of the pandemic eviction moratoriums were still in effect through a good chunk of those months last year. June of 2022 was when all of those restrictions were effectively removed. Most industry experts expected a surge of evictions during last summer—which did happen. But the eviction numbers haven’t really abated yet.
Here are the top 10 reasons for new calls for the first half of 2023, along with the percentage difference from the first half of 2022.
A couple of categories had substantial drops in call volume compared to this period last year. Landlords giving tenants a notice to vacate was down 32%, mostly because landlords were limited during the eviction moratoriums and frequently turned to less formal tenant removal options. Financial Aid questions were down sharply as well. Last year we dealt with a lot of questions regarding RenthelpMN. Finally, rent increase questions are down this year—not really because we aren’t still seeing sharp increases in rent, but instead there’s less confusion about where rent control/rent stabilization applies and how it’s being implemented.
The BEST SERVICE available, with very quick responses back! Thank you for all your help to me during a very rocky road!