With eviction ban gone, 3.5 million U.S. households could lose their home, Goldman estimates

Now that the Supreme Court has struck down eviction protections for most of the U.S., as many as 3.5 million households are at risk of losing their homes, including hundreds of thousands of tenants this year alone, according to a Wall Street analysis.

That's because federal rent assistance has been agonizingly slow to make it to renters, with just 10% of available funding having gone out by the end of July. Another factor is that many tenants behind on rent are in large cities with tight housing markets, which makes them more likely to face eviction, Goldman Sachs analysts said Monday in a research note. "The strength of the housing and rental market suggests landlords will try to evict tenants who are delinquent on rent unless they obtain federal assistance. And evictions could be particularly pronounced in cities hardest hit by the coronacrisis, since apartment markets are actually tighter in those cities," Goldman Sachs analysts wrote. "This reduces the incentive for landlords to negotiate with delinquent tenants or wait for federal aid."