When we think of landlords likely to file the most evictions, we often think of large, corporate landlords who operate market-rate properties as a profit-generating business. But when we looked more closely at the highest evicting properties in Bexar and Harris Counties, we found that a notable share are not market-rate developments at all. They are properties that benefit from public financing, tax exemptions, or income-restricted housing programs meant to serve low-income renters.
The majority of top evictors are market-rate properties. But subsidized developments appear on both counties’ high evictor lists – especially in Bexar County, where more than a third of the top 30 receive some form of public subsidy or tax exemption (or both). These include properties developed with Low-Income Housing Tax Credit (LIHTC) program funding or owned through tax-exempt private partnerships such as Public Facility Corporations (PFCs), Housing Finance Corporations (HFCs), or Public Housing Authorities (PHAs) that receive full property tax exemptions. In exchange for public subsidies, these properties provide income-restricted units with rents below market level.
This raises a trickier question than who is filing the most evictions: whether public investments in affordable housing are delivering the housing stability they are designed to create.
Public housing subsidies flow to high evictors in Bexar County
In Bexar County, nine LIHTC developments appear among the top 30 evictors in 2024. These properties posted eviction filing rates ranging from 26% to 55% – meaning that in some cases, half of all households or more faced an eviction filing in a single year.
Many LIHTC properties require multiple forms of public subsidy to support lowering rents below market rate. Eight of the nine also receive 100% property tax exemptions through tax-exempt private partnership ownership structures. Top evictors in Bexar and Harris counties account for $23.4 million in annual tax credits (adjusted to 2025 dollars) and $9.7 million in 2025 property tax savings.
Affordable housing programs like LIHTC and tax-exempt private partnerships are regulated. They come with affordability requirements, compliance monitoring, and tenant protection frameworks in the form of income-restricted reduced rents, required voucher acceptance, habitability standards, and in some cases “good cause” eviction requirements.
The presence of subsidized properties on high-evictor lists suggests that protections on paper do not always translate into stability in practice. This situation points to a critical, unaddressed question: When developments benefit from both federal tax credits and local property tax breaks, what level of housing stability should the public be able to expect in return?
Public entities purchase high evicting properties in Harris County
In Harris County, we see a related but distinct dynamic. Two properties that ranked among the highest evictors in both 2023 and 2024 were acquired in early 2025 by HFCs located hundreds of miles away.
These acquisitions occurred shortly before state lawmakers moved to prohibit “traveling HFC” deals – arrangements where an out-of-jurisdiction public entity could extend tax-exempt financing to properties without local approval, effectively removing them from local tax rolls. Both local properties were already top evictors before acquisition, raising serious questions about due diligence, oversight, and the criteria used to determine when public entities provide subsidies to privately operated housing.
The affordability requirements for Texas’ multifamily rental tax exemption tools do not necessarily result in substantially lower rents, sometimes leading to “affordable” housing that is very close–or identical–to market rate. The traveling HFC deals found in the Harris County top evictors converted high evicting market-rate properties into publicly subsidized ones – without necessarily changing the underlying management practices driving eviction filings. It will be important to monitor evictions at these properties in coming years to determine whether the stronger tenant protections required by HFC tax exemption reforms have the effect of lowering eviction rates at these high evictor properties.
Subsidy does not automatically equal stability
The presence of subsidized properties on a high evictor list may seem counterintuitive. Income-restricted housing is designed to serve renters with lower incomes by limiting rents to affordable levels, hopefully reducing the risk of eviction due to non-payment of rent. The programs that fund these units often come with stronger protections against other types of evictions.
But income restrictions do not guarantee housing stability. In fact, research shows that Public Housing Authorities are frequently top evictors. Like in Bexar and Harris counties, tax-exempt private partnership properties have also been identified as top evictors in Travis County.
Tenants in subsidized housing are, by definition, more economically vulnerable. They are more likely to experience job loss, income volatility, or other financial shocks that make it harder to keep up with rent – even when that rent is capped below market levels.
This suggests that some subsidy structures are not well designed for the economic realities of extremely low-income households. Research has found that while deeply subsidized public housing can reduce eviction risk, other forms of housing assistance like LIHTC and tax-exempt private partnerships may not have the same stabilizing effect unless specific eviction prevention policies are required.
Evidence that stronger housing stability protections matter
Policy design can address housing instability as a result of eviction at subsidized properties.
For example, the San Antonio Housing Trust implemented stronger tenant protection policies in recent years – including enhanced screening protections, just cause eviction standards, payment plan requirements, and expanded notice provisions. Notably, properties operating under the newer, more robust tenant protection frameworks do not appear among high-evictor lists, while earlier developments that are not required to follow those rules did.
This suggests that patterns of high eviction filings in publicly subsidized or supported housing are not inevitable. Program rules, enforcement mechanisms, and tenant protections can materially shape outcomes.
This analysis is the first step towards understanding how eviction practices intersect with publicly subsidized housing in Bexar and Harris counties. It points to the need for deeper research and greater transparency, particularly on these questions:
- How do eviction rates vary across different subsidy types and programs? Across different combinations and layerings of subsidies? Which are the most successful at lowering the number of eviction filings, and why?
- What accountability mechanisms exist when subsidized properties become chronic high evictors? Do monitoring agencies track eviction filings as part of program oversight?
- Are existing tenant protections in different programs strong enough to prevent avoidable evictions?
- How do ownership and management practices influence outcomes in subsidized housing? What are the best practices for regulating private actors in subsidy programs?
If public funds are one of our primary tools for addressing the affordable housing crisis, we need to ensure it is delivering not just affordability but lasting stability for the low-income tenants it is meant to serve.
Note: The annual LIHTC credit amount represents the annual tax credit LIHTC properties receive and has been converted from the year of the award to 2025 dollars using the Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI Inflation Calculator. LIHTC properties are awarded the annual amount for 10 years, meaning the total award is 10 times the annual credit. The property tax exemption amount represents one year’s worth of property tax savings at 2025 values and rates.
