Experts predict wave of evictions in the new year. In Beaufort Co., they’ve already begun
Before June, Wanda Boatright would spend six nights a week driving 230 miles across northern Beaufort County to deliver copies of the Beaufort Gazette and Wall Street Journal to 600 families’ doorsteps.
Then, she started chemotherapy for an autoimmune disease, and the treatment became so intense that she couldn’t work. Her husband took over her route, but the family’s income dropped.
Now, the family is facing eviction from Stuart Towne Apartments for being unable to pay rent. Her landlord filed the eviction papers in October, but because the federal ban on evictions extends until Dec. 31, the judge postponed the case until January. Boatright said she filled out the form required to show her landlord how her income had changed and how it would be illegal to evict her. The landlord declined to comment.
Boatright is one of many renters perched on a cliff before the new year, when the eviction ban expires and aid for the unemployed comes to a halt. According to the Census Bureau’s Household Pulse Survey, 23.1% of South Carolinians living in households behind on rent or mortgage expect to face eviction or foreclosure in the next two months. Nearly a tenth of South Carolinians reported that they were behind on their rent or mortgage or expected they wouldn’t be able to pay it next month.
While experts are predicting an onslaught of evictions in the new year, they have already begun to pick up here.
As of Dec. 15, 183 evictions have been served since COVID-19 erupted in South Carolina, according to data from the Beaufort County Sheriff’s Office. And they have been served at an increased clip in recent months, as people see their hours or jobs cut due to the tourism season ending. Forty-five people were evicted between March 17, when a short-lasting statewide eviction ban went into place, and the beginning of August. In the 4 1/2 months since, more than double that number have been kicked out.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s ban on evictions, which requires the renter to meet a series of qualifications to avoid getting kicked out, has seen mixed results. Some tenants facing eviction in Beaufort County said they were not aware the CDC form was an option.
The CARES Act ban, another law that prevented evictions for nonpayment of rent at federally assisted or -backed properties, expired in late July.
“Nothing but a headache”
Lindsey Edwards isn’t putting up Christmas decorations this year. The timing wouldn’t make sense, she says. At any moment, she, her husband and her two daughters could be evicted from their apartment at Oak Tree Village in Port Royal.
Edwards, a door attendant at Centerfold’s Gentlemen’s Club on Hilton Head, is due to give birth to another girl in mid-January.
Oak Tree Village has filed paperwork in court for 21 evictions since the pandemic started, and six tenants have been evicted through that process. But several tenants say many others have taken place off the books.
To evict tenants, landlords must file in court, South Carolina Appleseed Legal Justice Center’s website states.
“Your landlord cannot legally force you to leave any other way, like by changing your door locks, turning off the power, or putting your property outside,” the website states.
Oak Tree Village’s property manager, Jordan White, did not respond to multiple requests for comment by phone, at the property, and through Facebook messenger. When a reporter contacted the company that owns Oak Tree Village — Sureste Property Services — its general manager for operations, Whitney Jones, declined to answer questions regarding its business practices and evictions procedures, and threatened to call police.
Edwards, 26, is being evicted without a court filing. In a Facebook thread in late November, she answered a potential tenant’s question about living in Oak Tree Village by detailing her experience of poor upkeep and management. When another commenter mentioned the legal history of one of Oak Tree Village’s managers, Edwards asked which one she was referring to, naming White and a former property manager. It was neither.
On Nov. 30, Edwards received a notice signed by White saying she had 30 days to either move out of Oak Tree Village or “remedy our reason for evicting you.” White cited a section of the lease warning residents not to “engage in acts of violence, including but not limited to unlawful intimidation” and attached a screenshot of the Facebook conversation.
“I went through the whole lease agreement,” Edwards said. “There’s nothing in there stating that I can’t talk on social media; it’s basically my freedom of speech. It wasn’t intimidating. It wasn’t violent. It wasn’t a threat at all. I asked someone else to clarify who they were talking about.”
On Dec. 9, Edwards received another letter from management — this time saying her lease was being terminated and she had to move out by Dec. 16, two weeks before the initial date she was given. She doesn’t know why.
“I’ve been a really good tenant,” she said. “I’ve paid my rent two weeks in advance every month.”
Edwards plans to stay until Dec. 30, arguing that the eviction is illegal because it has not been filed in court. No one came to move her out Dec. 16. She plans to move her family into a home in downtown Port Royal.
They hope it will be better. Oak Tree Village, a complex previously known as August on Southside before it was sold last year, markets its apartments as luxury, yet their deteriorating conditions and record of code violations tell a different story. In a tour of her apartment, Edwards showed broken smoke detectors, water damage, roaches and dysfunctional or missing appliances. Outside, paint on the siding and porches had started to chip, exposing the wood decaying underneath.
“It’s just been nothing but a headache,” Edwards said.
Ebone Evans, who was evicted in February from Oak Tree Village for being behind on rent, said she experienced persistent mold problems and resulting respiratory issues while staying in the apartments. She and her husband spent eight months homeless after they were evicted, during which she gave birth to a stillborn baby and became pregnant again.
“We talked to other families and neighbors,” Evans said. “Their rent was fluctuating, and they had other issues in their apartments, so it made me feel a little bit better that we weren’t singled out, but it was still a really tough period. With COVID going on, it was a lot.”
As recently as July, code officers from the Town of Port Royal issued Oak Tree Village warnings for failure to maintain the property and having unsanitary conditions, including overflowing dumpsters. It is unclear from the reports whether those problems have been fixed.
Port Royal Police Capt. John Griffith said the apartment complex has struggled with violent crime in the past, but that has improved over the past year or two.
“They’re not immune from it, just like any other apartment complex,” he said. “There are issues over there, but I wouldn’t say there’s any more now than what there is in any other part of the town or county.”
Edwards said there is one well-kept building on the property: the leasing office. On a recent Tuesday, it was closed, with a sign making clear management’s zero-tolerance policy toward vocal tenants.
“If you cuss or raise your voice towards staff in the office, you will be asked to leave and you will not be allowed to return in the office. You will also receive a lease violation and possibly eviction due to breaking lease and being hostile towards staff!”
“Where do I go?”
Wanda Boatright, the paper carrier who lives at Stuart Towne Apartments, is not sure what she’ll do if she’s evicted in January. She is concerned no one will rent to her family — even though a nonprofit has stepped in to help pay for her first month’s rent and deposit.
“Once they’ve got an eviction on you, you’re done,” she said.
She’s worried her family of four will end up living in their car. Because she is immuno-compromised from the chemotherapy, she cannot stay in a homeless shelter, where COVID-19 may spread more easily.
“A lot of people can go to a homeless shelter,” Boatright said. “My husband and my kids can go to a homeless shelter, but what am I supposed to do? ... Where do I go?”
She said she has tried everything. Even if eviction proceedings are dismissed, and tenants get to stay in the apartment, the filing usually remains on their record. South Carolina is one of the cheapest states for landlords to file evictions, costing roughly $40 to $45, depending on the county.
“Once they stick the letter on my door, I’ve got 24 hours to be out of my house,” Boatright said. “So by Jan. 8, me and my kids and my husband will be homeless.”
Taking a toll
Chanel Priester was evicted from Taylor’s Rental Homes in Beaufort in November after she was unable to pay her rent. Her eviction followed months of watching her neighbors get evicted as the pandemic swept the state. Just before Thanksgiving, Priester, her two children and her mother were forced to leave their two-bedroom mobile home.
Priester had lost her job at a nail salon due to the pandemic. Unable to find another job due to her pregnancy, she fell behind on rent and could not catch up with the high late fees.
“It’s been a pretty big toll on all of us,” she said. “My daughter is only 2, my son is six months. They honestly don’t know what’s going on at the moment. It’s been harder now than ever, especially with COVID.”
Priester moved to Georgia, and her mom moved to New York. She said she had heard about the CDC’s eviction ban, but did not know if it was true and had not heard about it from Taylor’s, which did not respond to repeated requests for comment.
“There are people out here going through a very hard time due to COVID, and many people have lost their homes to this,” she said. “It’s getting worse.”
This story was originally published December 20, 2020 at 7:15 AM.
