The tenant hotline’s calls/emails were the 2nd highest totals since opening in 1992, only down slightly in 2024 from 2023’s record numbers. Over the last two years, we averaged over 20,000 calls per year. In 2024, we took 19,933 new calls compared to 20,086 in 2023, a less than 1% decrease. Follow-ups were also our 2nd highest total ever with 15,407 follow-ups. That means that we once again eclipsed 35,000 total calls, which we’ve done for each of the last three years.
Calls/Emails:
Normally, we only list the top 10 reasons for calls in a given time frame, but just to show a bit more about the breadth of the work we do, we’re listing the top 15 reasons for hotline calls for all of 2024 compared to the number of calls for 2023.
| Contact Reason | Number of Contacts | Change from 2023 |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Repairs | 5,341 | + 6% |
| 2. Evictions | 4,783 | – 17% |
| 3. Security Deposits | 2,103 | + 8% |
| 4. Break Lease Questions | 1,789 | + 8% |
| 5. Landlord Notice to Vacate | 1,362 | – 11% |
| 6. Lease Questions | 1,263 | + 10% |
| 7. Privacy/Intrusion | 849 | + 8% |
| 8. Financial Aid | 816 | + 8% |
| 9. Fees | 783 | + 4% |
| 10. Neighbors | 687 | + 15% |
| 11. Rent Increase | 621 | + 1% |
| 12. Tenant Notice to Vacate | 553 | – 7% |
| 13. Discrimination | 518 | – 3% |
| 14. Change Lease Terms | 507 | + 21% |
| 15. Harassment | 427 | – 8% |
In 10 of these 15 categories, we actually had an increase in calls in 2024, but the category that really is responsible for our slight dip in calls overall is actually very encouraging; fewer eviction calls.
This has been covered a lot this year, but eviction filings are down in Minnesota in 2024. The numbers are still way too high, but there was a 13% reduction in eviction cases filed in MN in 2024, which led to 996 fewer eviction calls to our hotline. Why were there fewer evictions in 2024? the law changed.
Starting 1/1/2024, landlords statewide were required to give a 14-day written warning before filing an eviction for non-payment of rent. In Minnesota, roughly 90% of evictions are filed for non-payment of rent, so this change in the law led to fewer evictions being filed and fewer tenants calling HOME Line about evictions.
This state law change was something that HOME Line, along with a lot of others, worked on changing for decades. It was a massive change in eviction law in Minnesota and has had an immediate and critical impact.
Speeches
HOME Line continues to be a recognized expert in tenant/landlord law and our commitment to educating the public through presentations on key aspects of tenant/landlord law led to 116 speeches in 2024 for over 4,227 attendees. This was the most speeches we’ve given in a calendar year since 2010. We spoke in 31 different cities in 18 different counties. Since opening in 1992, we’ve given over 2,600 speeches to more than 82,000 attendees.
Multi-lingual service
The hotline has staff fluent in English, Hmong, Somali and Spanish. In recent years, we’ve worked hard to connect with our clients in many different communities, and set a record in contacts either in Hmong, Somali, Spanish or more than one language. In 2024, we took 1,124 of these contacts, a 9% increase over last year’s previous record high number. Note that as recently as 2021, we only took 524 calls in one of these languages—more than doubling this work in three years.
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