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Comment

My name is Sloan and I am a tenant living in Bozeman, Montana. I am a member of Bozeman Tenants United and the Homes Guarantee Campaign.

The rent has hiked up so much in just the last couple years. In 2020 me and my husband were renting a 3 bedroom apartment for $1600/month and that was very do-able. We then moved to a rental house later that year and we’re now being asked to move out three years later after the landlord wanted to sell the house. So we went back to our old apartment complex. A 3 bedroom apartment currently as of 2023 is ~$3,500 and is unaffordable. So we currently live in a 2 bedroom for $2,250 with one roommate.

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.

Sincerely,
Sloan