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Hello, my name is Hector, I am a former tenant from Las Vegas, Nevada, who also rented in Reno. Growing up, my family has had to move a few times because of the cost of housing. At one point, my family of 4, sometimes 5, had to move into a two bedroom apartment because that was all we could afford. While in Reno, the rents began to skyrocket due to Tesla moving in, I struggled to keep afloat as a first gen student living away from home. I had to work two jobs, go into debt, and drop out just to keep a roof over my head. I’m lucky to own a home now but I still urge you to protect tenants.

The rent is too damn high. The Federal Housing Finance Agency should protect tenants by limiting annual rent hikes to 1.5 times the Consumer Price Index or 3%, whichever is lower, in properties with federally backed mortgages. These limits should be applied universally as a requirement to all federally backed mortgage programs.
In addition to limits on rent hikes, the FHFA should prohibit evictions without good cause, ban source of income discrimination, enforce and expand existing protections against discrimination, require safe and accessible housing conditions, create a landlord registry, require fair and standardized leases, ensure tenants have the right to organize, and create an Office of Tenant Protections to enforce these rights in all properties with federally backed mortgages.