Corporate home ownership rose in the third quarter of 2021 at the fastest pace in almost two decades. For example, institutional investors bought 42.8% of all homes for sale in the Atlanta-metro area and 38% of homes in the Phoenix, Glendale, Scottsdale area. Bulk-purchase sales of foreclosed properties and distressed properties led the trend. The large companies and banks tended to purchase homes where over forty percent of the residents were African-American, more than three times above the national average.
The largest publicly traded property groups in the US saw their combined earnings surge more than 50% last year, with top executives receiving 20% higher bonuses than the previous year. Take Mid-America Apartment Communities, the largest multifamily housing owner in the U.S., with 100,000 units under its purview. Mid-America's profits more than doubled in 2021 to $550 million. And Starwood Property Trust, a major real-estate investment company, boasted of a "record" year in 2021, during which time its net income rose by one-third, to $492 million. Speaking to investors on a call in February, Starwood's CEO noted that "tenants seem capable and willing to pay these rent increases" and called inflation "an extraordinary gift that keeps on giving" for the company's affordable housing properties in Florida. (Starwood's parent, Starwood Capital Group, says it controls 220,000 housing units and 380,000 hotel rooms, among other assets.) "When you see the nation's largest apartment companies bank nearly $5 billion and their top executives' pay soar by over 22% from last year, it's obvious the punishing rental prices on our most vulnerable populations are driven by corporate greed," Kyle Herrig, president of Accountable.US, said in a statement. "Big apartment companies have joined the long list of industries using the pandemic as cover to charge working families far beyond any new cost of doing business."