How Chicago’s COVID Eviction Ban Made One Woman Homeless

What happens when you move for a new job, rent out your condominium, and then a global pandemic strikes? Then the government imposes lockdowns that cause you lose your job, and your tenants lose theirs, and government imposes a ban on eviction? This story has played out all across the country.

But Katrina Bilella lived this story out in vivid terms. She didn’t do anything wrong, getting a new job in a different city and renting out her condominum in Chicago to cover the mortgage. The people who rented from her lost their jobs because Covid-19 shutdowns, then so did Bilella.

Now Bilella wanted to move back to her own apartment in Chicago, but not only had the couple she rented it to had stopped paying rent, but they refused to move. Bilella herself was now homeless.

Why didn’t government think through the consequences of shutting down the economy? And why were eviction bans the answer rather than fast relief to cover rent?

You can read about Katrina Bilella’s story at Forbes where I write about the chain of events that led to her being without a place to live and more about the broader impact on the housing economy of ill advised eviction bans combined with no rent relief or programs that are too byzantine and arbitrary to help.