We’re 1/3 of the way through 2023, and the tenant hotline continues on its record pace.
This month, we’ll focus on total calls, which means new calls plus follow-up calls. So far, in 2023, we’ve taken 12,165 total calls compared to 10,170 calls at this point in 2022—a 16% increase in total call volume over last year at this time.
Why is this happening? We’ve highlighted the increase in eviction filings repeatedly in this newsletter since all of the pandemic-based eviction moratoriums were lifted last June, but what we had hoped would only be an initial surge of evictions hasn’t let up—elevated eviction filings have remained pretty steady.
The total call numbers also reflect the increasing complexity of questions that tenants need help answering. When HOME Line opened in 1992, the average lease was 1-5 pages. Now? It’s very common to see leases that exceed 50 pages. There are a lot more rules, rent is much higher, and things are just generally more complex. This year, we’ve reviewed documents in 2,894 cases because we weren’t able to answer the tenant’s question without reviewing key documents like the lease, court papers, etc. At this point last year, we’d reviewed documents in only 1,481 cases meaning document reviews are up 49% this year. Cases that require documents be reviewed generally require more time on average meaning calls take more time than they did before.
Here are the top 10 reasons for new calls for April.
I applaud you all for all the work you do with the increased calls.
Francis Klees
Caledonia, MN
Ithank you are doing great job,