Tacoma, Wash an example of RE death?

There is no surer way to abruptly stop the flow of new housing than to impose rent control or moratoriums on eviction. Government policy is full of well-meaning idiots who aren't aware of the unintended consequences of their ill-conceived actions.

No Evictions, Less Affordable Housing

That’s what happened in Tacoma, and even public housing is suffering.

By The Editorial Board, WSJ

Dec. 25, 2025 2:14 pm ET

Voters in Tacoma, Wash., sought to help renters a few years go by passing a ballot initiative that restricted tenant evictions. What do you think happened next? Yes, many more deadbeats, and even the public housing authority is pleading for relief.

The 2023 ballot measure prohibited “cold weather” evictions between Nov. 1 and April 1, and during the school year if the renting family included a student or “educator.”

“Since the moratorium has taken effect, people are going a year or more without paying rent,” April Black, executive director of the Tacoma Housing Authority, told the local press this month. Some 38% of the public housing authority’s tenants have fallen behind on the rent, up from 15% before the ballot measure, the Seattle Times reports.

Before the restrictions, landlords could start eviction proceedings to nudge tenants into repayment agreements. But now “when we get to eviction, the debts are so high that they can’t resolve those debts and they do get evicted,” Ms. Black said.

The housing authority has had to tap more than $400,000 in reserves to cover losses—“dollars that could have otherwise been spent to serve households on our waiting list” for affordable housing, Ms. Black said.

Lo, this month the Tacoma City Council voted 7-2 to provide an exemption for the Tacoma Housing Authority, nonprofit landlords and landlords who rent out a unit at their home. Landlords with fewer than five units will also get a carve-out from the winter evictions ban, and the City Council narrowed the cold-weather period by a month, from Nov. 15 to March 15.

The exempted can now breathe easier. But “if the highly subsidized housing groups cannot make their business work in this type of environment, how are small rental housing providers who own just a couple of units supposed to make this work?” asks Corey Hjalseth of the Rental Housing Association of Washington, an industry group.

Good question. More than three-fourths of the association’s members with apartments in Tacoma said they have sold or will sell at least one unit there. The eviction rules have “regulated the small providers that we represent out of the market,” Mr. Hjalseth says.

The association’s 2024 survey found more than 80% of Tacoma’s remaining landlords said they are tightening their tenant screening. This means fewer landlords willing to take a risk on tenants with low income or poor credit.

And people wonder why there’s a shortage of affordable housing? Because of bad policy like this masquerading as compassion.