Renters in metro Atlanta and across the Southeast are facing steep increases in older, lower-cost housing compared to their richer counterparts in luxury housing, according to a report by the Private Equity Stakeholder Project.
The paper, “The Poorest Renters, The Sharpest Increases: Examining the Rent Crisis in Workforce Housing,” found the Atlanta suburbs are experiencing some of the widest gaps in the rate of rent hikes.
Private Equity Stakeholder Project’s housing director Jordan Ash said population growth and weak tenant protections make the region appealing to investors and private equity landlords.
He added that the nonprofit watchdog group’s report, published in October, challenges the idea that soaring rents are affecting renters at similar rates across the lower, middle and upper income tiers.
“Some people are being affected much more acutely than others, and it’s the folks who actually can least afford it,” Ash said.
The report defines workforce housing as “the lowest-rent sector of market rate housing in which tenants do not receive government subsidies,” as opposed to units aimed at middle-income earners such as white-collar workers and first responders.
It’s a type of aging, unsubsidized housing stock that typically has fewer amenities. Millions of low-wage workers in the U.S., two-thirds of whom cannot rent an apartment using government subsidies, are more likely to live in it, according to the report.
Nationwide, workforce housing rents rose more than 20% between 2021 and 2025. That’s twice the rate of rent increases for luxury apartments, which are usually aimed at high-income households renting by choice rather than necessity, the paper found.
Rents for suburban workforce housing in the metro Atlanta region increased by almost 20%, while rents for luxury units increased by 2%, making the metro areas’ suburbs among those with the widest gaps between affluent and low-income renters, as rents rose at nine times the rate of discretionary housing.
The story was similar across the Southeast, where rents for low-cost housing increased seven times faster than for high-end units, the report found.
Housing expert Taylor Shelton, an associate professor in the Department of Geosciences at Georgia State University, said demand has increased at the lower end of the housing market because of worsening income inequality.
“We’ve not had any concerted effort to build enough housing at those affordable or deeply affordable levels to keep rents in check or provide a kind of counterbalance,” Shelton said.
Caitlin Sugrue Walter, senior vice president and head of research and innovation for the industry group National Multifamily Housing Council, said the report’s findings on rising rents were in line with its own research.
However, she argued that as more supply is introduced in the higher-end markets, that will “filter down” to low-income and middle-income markets, slowing rent growth and improving affordability.
“While I agree with the research findings, I disagree with their interpretation that it’s corporate landlords profiteering,” Walter said.
Credit: arvin.temkar@ajc.com
Credit: arvin.temkar@ajc.com
Tara Hill Apartment Homes, a 132-unit complex in Clayton County, is featured in the report.
Built in the early 1970s, the property has changed hands several times since 2013, the paper said, most recently in March 2022, when Praxis Capital sold it for $13 million to Sarmaya Capital, which did not respond to a request for comment.
“This revolving door of quick transactions is typical of a workforce housing property that is being used as a means to generate speculative value,” the report stated.
Since early 2011, there have been 781 eviction filings at Tara Hill, or an average of 52 per year, with an annual eviction filing rate across corporate owners of 39%, according to the report.
In Clayton County, the eviction filing rate in 2018 was about 45%, roughly 37 points above the national average, according to Eviction Lab data.
The rent increase rate at Tara Hill between 2021 and 2025 was 22%, the report found.
Alison Johnson, Housing Justice League executive director, said officials often frame workforce housing as belonging to middle-income earners such as teachers, firefighters, and police, when it extends to low-wage workers too.
“It’s about how they are categorizing workforce housing so they’re not impeding the people who get up and go to work at Burger King. They’re not impeding the people who work at Starbucks,” she said.
Johnson said the influence of corporate landlords and private equity investors has been “disastrous” for metro Atlanta renters.
The Private Equity Stakeholder Project’s report outlines reforms to protect renters in workforce housing, including good-cause eviction laws, a right to representation by a civil attorney in eviction proceedings, rent control and workforce investment standards.
According to the Private Equity Stakeholder Project, the analysis of suburban Atlanta included municipalities across the metro region, including parts of Fulton, Gwinnett, Cobb, DeKalb, Henry, and Clayton counties.
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