Seattle-area eviction cases spike as pandemic aid dries up

Landlords across Washington filed nearly twice as many eviction cases in October as they did a year earlier, a stark increase after the end of the state’s final pandemic renter protections.

Facing more eviction cases and dwindling financial assistance, tenants are scrambling for help, attorneys are stretched thin and legal advocates are seeking relief from state lawmakers.

“It’s a nightmare,” said Edmund Witter, senior managing attorney for the Housing Justice Project in King County, where property owners and managers filed 600 eviction cases in October, the highest monthly total in at least seven years. King County tenant attorneys handle 30 to 40 eviction cases at a time, and, in an effort to juggle the growing number of cases, the organization recently shifted to helping tenants who are further along in the eviction process, Witter said.

Eviction filings are on the rise from Seattle to Spokane. Landlords filed more than twice as many cases in October than a year ago in King, Snohomish and Clark counties, according to data from the Administrative Office of the Courts and the Office of Civil Legal Aid. Filings were up 60% or more in Pierce and Spokane counties.

The increase marks a departure from last year, when some pandemic protections had lapsed but filings were still below pre-pandemic norms. Since then, the final protections have expired, including requirements that landlords offer payment plans and attempt mediation before evicting tenants. Cases picked up notably after those rules ended this spring and summer.

Yet the recent jump in eviction cases surprised even those who anticipated an increase.

Tenant attorneys expected an increase in cases in August and September, but “we were really shocked to see the most recent numbers,” said Philippe Knab, who manages the eviction defense program at the Office of Civil Legal Aid. The office oversees Washington’s program providing attorneys for low-income tenants facing eviction.

“The reality is we need more lawyers,” Knab said. 

The office is seeking $3 million in emergency funding from the state to hire 10 more attorneys and one additional staff person for the next two years, in addition to funding already budgeted for tenant attorneys. Lawmakers will consider that request when they convene in January.

In the meantime, OCLA is urging courts across the state to help by limiting the cases heard each week, lengthening case timelines or taking other steps. Without those changes, the office warns that attorneys may no longer be able to serve tenants in some areas. That would halt eviction cases in those areas, a dramatic “action of last resort” that would harm both tenants and landlords, the office warned.

Backlog “waiting to happen”

Landlord and tenant advocates say cases have increased because the state’s last remaining pandemic-era tenant protections have ended, financial assistance is much more scarce and some landlords are eager to begin the eviction process.

“There was a backlog of evictions waiting to happen,” said Tacoma landlord attorney Judson Gray.

That backlog is frustrating some landlords, particularly in King County. Given monthslong timelines for eviction cases currently underway in King County, Seattle landlord attorney Evan Loeffler said some property owners may be filing sooner than they otherwise would.

After months or years of restrictions, “a lot of landlords have lost patience,” Loeffler said.

Washington landlords attempting to evict tenants must first give them notice to pay what they owe (or correct some other issue) before filing the case in court. After the pandemic hit, the state also required landlords to notify tenants about mediation programs before filing the case. That requirement expired this summer.

Another protection is essentially over, too: State law required landlords to offer payment plans for unpaid rent that stacked up during the height of the pandemic, between March 2020 and the end of April 2023. Debt accrued after that is not subject to that rule.

“All those things worked together to keep [eviction cases] at manageable numbers, but as pieces of the puzzle have fallen away, we’re kind of left holding the burden,” said Jane Pak, executive director of Snohomish County Legal Services.

Meanwhile, financial assistance for tenants behind on their rent has waned significantly. Washington distributed more than $800 million dollars in one-time federal funds earlier in the pandemic. The state has since started a smaller permanent rent assistance program, which will distribute about $119 million over the next two years. In future years, the state expects to distribute less funding, about $30 million to $40 million a year.

Missed rent is the top reason for eviction in Washington, making up about 62% of cases in which tenants received legal help, according to a University of Washington review of the first two years of the right-to-counsel program. 

With fewer resources to help tenants pay their debts, “there seems to be a little less patience on the landlord and property-management side,” Witter said.

Tenant attorneys often help their clients search for rent assistance and other help. That is now happening “in a time [when] attorneys are as busy as they’ve ever been and resources are as scarce as they’ve ever been,” Knab said.

Landlords in King County are also frustrated with long timelines for the Superior Court to hear and resolve their cases, sometimes as long as six months. The state’s most populous county has the highest number of eviction cases and local rules make some cases more complex. 

Landlord and tenant attorneys blame each other for dragging out certain cases. Loeffler argued some tenant attorneys “have become something of zealots who will do anything to make it take longer and keep the tenants in there forever.”

Tenant attorneys say they take the time necessary to effectively represent their clients. “A right to counsel is nothing unless you have effective representation,” Witter said.

King County is a “significant outlier” in its timelines for eviction cases, said Knab, from the Office of Civil Legal Aid. In some more rural counties, attorneys have just a day or a few days to prepare for a case, he said.

Limiting rent hikes

The spike in eviction cases also calls into question the effectiveness of more permanent state and local reforms meant to curb evictions. State law now limits no-cause evictions, Seattle limits evictions during the winter months and school year, and cities around the region require extra notice of rent hikes.

State Sen. Patty Kuderer, D-Bellevue, who sponsored many of the state’s recent eviction reforms, said the case numbers indicate a greater need to address high rents. 

She plans to propose a bill to make an existing tax break for landlords contingent on limiting rent increases. Under that proposal, the state would direct revenue from landlords who opted to pay the tax toward rental assistance. (Opponents are likely to challenge the proposal in court, Kuderer noted.) Other lawmakers are likely to reintroduce mandatory limits on rent increases, proposals that failed last year after fierce landlord opposition.

“We can slow the [eviction] process all we want, but if the rent continues to go up and up and up,” tenants will continue to struggle, Kuderer said.

The region also faces an ongoing housing shortage. The state projects King County will need more than 15,000 new homes each year for the coming two decades, many for people with low incomes.

“At its core, this is an income inequality issue,” Kuderer said.

Tenant and landlord attorneys say they’re unsure whether eviction numbers will drop again to pre-pandemic levels or below. In Snohomish County, where local cities do not have significant extra protections, Pak expects “it’s not going to get better; it’s likely going to get worse.”

In King County, the filings may be a “correction” from landlords who waited until regulations expired to attempt to evict their tenants, but financial pressures continue to squeeze tenants, Witter said.

“I think the lack of a safety net and the inflationary pressure on rents is just starting to take its toll,” he said. “I don’t know if this is a temporary thing. It’s scary.”