The Organization of Neglect: Limited Liability Companies and Housing Disinvestment

Travis, Adam

doi:10.1177/0003122418821339

Cited by 44 publications

(24 citation statements)

References 69 publications

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“…With a limited supply of public and nonprofit housing, policy solutions seeking a broad impact must inevitably target private landlords, who serve as gatekeepers for the overwhelming majority of US renters. This focus aligns with research indicating that private landlords' decisions to set rent and screening criteria, accept or reject housing vouchers, and evict and select tenants significantly shape renters' housing experiences (Rosen 2014;Desmond 2016;Greif 2018;A. Travis 2019).…”

Section: Introductionsupporting

confidence: 70%

“…Recent studies have found that the regulation of private rental owners can yield unintended and negative consequences for renters, particularly vulnerable tenants. Adam Travis (2019) found that legal changes that decreased owners' financial risk prompted some rental owners to let their properties fall into disrepair, a cost borne by tenants, particularly those in poor neighborhoods. Meredith Greif (2018) likewise observed that landlords' business practices are sensitive to the legal environment.…”

Section: The Limits Of Antidiscrimination Lawmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Research shows that landlords draw on a mix of professional and on-the-job knowledge of neighborhoods, tenants, law, and government programs when making decisions about their properties (Rosen 2014;Desmond 2016;Greif 2018;A. Travis 2019).…”

Section: Culture Of Ownershipmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Risk, Property Rights, and Antidiscrimination Law in Rental Housing: Toward a Property-in-Action Framework

Brydolf-Horwitz¹

2020

Law Soc. Inq.

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Landlords’ decisions significantly shape the housing outcomes of poor and stigmatized renters. Despite this important gatekeeping role, studies of antidiscrimination law have not thoroughly examined how private market actors respond to reform efforts or how private property rights potentially enable them to evade regulation. This study draws on ethnographic data gathered between late 2015 and early 2018 to examine how and why Seattle landlords opposed an ordinance regulating the use of criminal records in rental housing. The findings indicate that landlords’ opposition stems from their expectation that property protects owners’ ability to control their exposure to risk. Yet conceptions of property and risk perception alone cannot explain how landlords can evade regulation. Toward this end, I show how private property rights facilitate adaptation by which landlords can legally circumvent the intent of the law. The study highlights the value of a sociolegal framework of property in action, which incorporates cultural notions of ownership, legal rights, and the regulatory and market environments that shape owners’ discretion. I suggest that greater attention to risk discourse and property rights will deepen our understanding of the limits of antidiscrimination law and the ability of private market actors to adapt to, and resist, legal reform efforts.

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Section: Introductionsupporting

confidence: 70%

Section: The Limits Of Antidiscrimination Lawmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Risk, Property Rights, and Antidiscrimination Law in Rental Housing: Toward a Property-in-Action Framework

Brydolf-Horwitz¹

2020

Law Soc. Inq.

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“…Landlord logics can incorporate a variety of influences. Similar to most economic roles, many scholars assume that profit calculations guide landlord decision making (e.g., Desmond and Perkins 2016;Travis 2019). However, economic sociologists have long identified the role of noneconomic influences, such as social relations, in influencing economic decisions (DiMaggio and Louch 1998;Granovetter 1985).…”

Section: Tenants Landlords and Pathways To Ownershipmentioning

confidence: 99%

Understanding the Divergent Logics of Landlords: Circumstantial versus Deliberate Pathways

Shiffer-Sebba

2020

City & Community

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Landlords are important gatekeepers in the rental market, and scholars have studied landlord perceptions across different markets. But differences between landlord logics within a market, which drive landlord behaviors, have been largely unexamined. Drawing chiefly on 30 in-depth landlord interviews and 20 observations with property managers in Philadelphia, I argue that landlords exhibit a range of logics. When faced with rental market decisions, some employ profit-maximizing criteria, whereas others consider social closeness with tenants or the meanings of properties. These differences relate to pathways into property ownership: landlords who obtain property circumstantially focus on profit maximization less than those who purchase property deliberately to pursue profits. This paper extends our understanding of landlords, connecting their pathways to a range of logics within a single market context. It also suggests that policies should consider the logics of landlords they seek to influence.

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“…Today, market forces interact with more subtle prejudices among buyers, realtors, and lenders to produce similar outcomes (Massey and Denton 1998;Trounstine 2018). Where renewed investment does occur in low-income neighborhoods, it disproportionately comes in the form of speculative ownership, and investor-owned properties are more likely to suffer neglect and disrepair (Travis 2019), increasing the risk of exposure to environmental hazards within the home.…”

Section: Place Poverty and Environmental Inequality: A General Frammentioning

confidence: 99%

Toxic Neighborhoods: The Joint Effects of Concentrated Poverty and Environmental Lead Contamination on Cognitive Development during Early Childhood

Wodtke¹,

Ramaj²,

Schachner³

2020

Preprint

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Although socioeconomic disparities in cognitive ability emerge early in the life course, most research on the developmental consequences of living in a disadvantaged neighborhood focuses on school-age children or adolescents. In this study, we outline and test a theoretical model of neighborhood effects on cognitive development during early childhood that highlights the mediating role of environmental health hazards, and in particular, exposure to neurotoxic lead. To evaluate this model, we follow a cohort of 1,266 children in the Project on Human Development in Chicago Neighborhoods from birth through the time of school entry, matching them at each survey wave with information on neighborhood composition and the areal risk of lead exposure. With these data, we then estimate the joint effects of neighborhood poverty and environmental lead contamination on receptive vocabulary ability. We find that sustained exposure to disadvantaged neighborhoods substantially reduces vocabulary ability during early childhood and that nearly all of this effect may operate through a causal mechanism involving lead contamination. These findings are robust to unobserved confounding and to the use of several alternative estimation strategies, which suggests that living in a disadvantaged neighborhood impedes early childhood development because it increases exposure to environmental toxins like lead.

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The Organization of Neglect: Limited Liability Companies and Housing Disinvestment

Cited by 44 publications

References 69 publications

Risk, Property Rights, and Antidiscrimination Law in Rental Housing: Toward a Property-in-Action Framework

Risk, Property Rights, and Antidiscrimination Law in Rental Housing: Toward a Property-in-Action Framework

Understanding the Divergent Logics of Landlords: Circumstantial versus Deliberate Pathways

Toxic Neighborhoods: The Joint Effects of Concentrated Poverty and Environmental Lead Contamination on Cognitive Development during Early Childhood

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