Financialized landlords disproportionately apply to evict in Black neighbourhoods, study finds
2026/01/19 2 Comments
Good data-based study:
Tenants of financialized landlords in high-income, majority-Black Toronto neighbourhoods faced 33 eviction applications per 100 households from 2016 to 2019 — a rate five times higher than the city average for that landlords group of 5.6 per 100 households, a new study has found.
“Financialized landlords” in the study refers to asset managers, real estate investment trusts, family conglomerates and “financialized property managers” focused on maximizing the value of portfolio assets for investors.
The report conducted by researchers at Toronto Metropolitan University, funded in part by the Canadian government and published in the International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, draws from more than 100,000 formal eviction filings for purpose-built rental apartments in Toronto from 2016 through 2021.
It found renters in Black-majority neighbourhoods experience “disproportionately high rates of housing instability and eviction filings by financialized landlords” and argues “profit-driven motives systematically undermine Black lives and spaces.”
From 2016 to 2019, eviction rates in Black-majority areas, “regardless of income level, were significantly higher than in other racial/ethnocultural groups, with few exceptions.”
The eviction-application rate in high-income, majority-Black neighbourhoods was more than double the rate of 14 per cent in low-income, majority-Black neighbourhoods from 2016 to 2019, the report found.
The study categorized neighbourhoods as “low-income” or “high-income” depending on whether the areas had median renter household after-tax incomes above or below the Toronto renter median for the census year ($42,000 for 2016 and $57,600 for 2021).
Lead researcher Nemoy Lewis, an assistant professor at TMU’s School of Urban and Regional Planning, said this finding challenges common assumptions about evictions….
Source: Financialized landlords disproportionately apply to evict in Black neighbourhoods, study finds
About Andrew
Multicultural Meanderings 
Another day, another neologism.
““Financialized landlords” in the study refers to asset managers, real estate investment trusts, family conglomerates and “financialized property managers” focused on maximizing the value of portfolio assets for investors.”
Who financialized them? Whoever came up with this phrase seems to subscribe to the same worldview as those who created the phrase “racialized Canadians.” At least there one may be able to point to “the system” as having racialized them.
But financialization? Is the implication that there should not be REITs or family conglomerates which own properties for rental? The corollary to this is that only individual owners should own property for rental. Wow, talk about worsening the housing crisis.
Now, as to the substance of the article, it notes a particular trend of evictions in high-income, Black neighbourhoods. But what are the confounding variables? In high-income, Black neighbourhoods, are rentals underpriced, due to the length of time people stay in their rental units and the existence of rent control? It seems the authors have done some interesting analysis, but the article raises more questions for me than it answers. And of course, I am neither surprised, nor bothered, by a corporation maximizing its profits; this is simply the goal of firms in a market economy.
As always, high level numbers raised questions about the reasons for these variances that are often more complex than the general conclusion….
We should have a coffee together as I appreciate your ongoing interest in my blog and your regular comments. agriffith232@gmail.com