Gentrifying Atlanta: Investor Purchases of Rental Housing, Evictions, and the Displacement of Black Residents

Elora Lee Raymond, Ben Miller, Michaela McKinney and Jonathan Braun

Housing Policy Debate, 2021, vol. 31, issue 3-5, 818-834

Abstract: Displacement of Black communities through gentrification is a major concern among policymakers, community groups, and advocates. This research investigates whether investor purchases of multifamily rental housing predict evictions and the displacement of Black residents from Atlanta, Georgia, between 2000 and 2016. In a series of quantitative analyses, we identify the financialization of rental housing and subsequent eviction-led displacement as key neighborhood-level processes in racial transition and the gentrification of Atlanta. We find that eviction judgments grew by 8% annually in the Atlanta region, and same-site apartment sale prices increased by an average of $5.5 million. Investor purchases of rental housing in a neighborhood predict a spike in eviction judgments in the same year, and presage racial transition. Neighborhoods with investor purchases of apartment buildings lose 166 Black residents and gain 109 White residents over a 6-year period compared with adjacent neighborhoods with no investor purchases.

Date: 2021
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/10511482.2021.1887318 (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:taf:houspd:v:31:y:2021:i:3-5:p:818-834

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.tandfonline.com/pricing/journal/RHPD20

DOI: 10.1080/10511482.2021.1887318

Access Statistics for this article

Housing Policy Debate is currently edited by Tom Sanchez, Susanne Viscarra and Derek Hyra

More articles in Housing Policy Debate from Taylor & Francis Journals
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chris Longhurst ().