Testimony in Support of An Act enabling cities and towns to stabilize rents and protect tenants

RE: Testimony in support of S1447, An Act enabling cities and towns to stabilize rents and protect tenants.

Chair Rausch, Chair Lewis and distinguished members of the Joint Committee on Municipalities and Regional Government:

Thank you for the opportunity to submit written testimony in support of S1447, An Act enabling cities and towns to stabilize rents and protect tenants. This legislation would allow cities and towns to place limits on extreme rent increases, improving housing stability as the Commonwealth faces a deep housing affordability crisis.

MassBudget is a non-partisan, non-profit research and advocacy organization. We provide rigorous research and policy analysis, along with strategic advocacy in partnership with grassroots organizations. MassBudget has done extensive research and offers critical expertise in housing policy and the state budget. We believe everyone has a right to safe and affordable housing. We support restrictions on extreme rent increases as part of a comprehensive affordable housing strategy.

The bill before you seeks to allow cities and towns to enact rent stabilization at the local level, which will improve housing stability by protecting tenants from rent gouging. The legislation being considered would give communities the option to limit annual increases to the rate of inflation, and contains reasonable exemptions for owner-occupied rental properties and new development.

Rents across the Commonwealth are rising at nearly double the rate of inflation. Census data show that the median rent in Massachusetts grew by more than 53 percent from 2016-2023, while cumulative inflation was only 28.4 percent for the same time period.¹ This rate of rent growth has contributed to a displacement crisis with significant human costs, and has led to increased rates of housing instability across the state. More than half of Massachusetts renters are cost-burdened, with the burden falling disproportionately on communities of color.²

Rapidly increasing rents are threatening the sustainability of the Commonwealth’s housing assistance programs. The Commonwealth’s housing assistance programs are under stress due to rent increases that routinely outpace inflation. Because rental vouchers must bridge the gap between a recipient’s income and rent on the private market, the cost to the state of providing a voucher has increased significantly over the past several years. The Commonwealth has made commendable investments into the Massachusetts Rental Voucher Program (MRVP), but they are barely enough to keep up with the cost of supporting its existing vouchers. According to state data, the cost to the state of a rental voucher increased by more than 39 percent from 2023 to 2025.³ Ensuring the sustainability of the state’s housing safety net will require a range of interventions to rein in housing costs, including rent stabilization.

Evictions are back to pre-pandemic levels, further stressing the housing safety net. With some of the highest rates of rent burden in the nation, evictions in Massachusetts returned to pre-pandemic levels when moratoria were lifted between late 2020 and early 2021.⁴ This high rate of housing instability puts further stress on the Commonwealth’s housing safety net because renters with an eviction notice are a primary population served by emergency assistance through Residential Assistance for Families in Transition (RAFT). More renters being evicted because they cannot make rent means more people will have to turn to state-funded emergency assistance.

Massachusetts has taken important steps to strengthen its housing safety net programs, such as maintaining an expanded emergency rental assistance program after the pandemic and operating some of the only state-level voucher programs in the nation. State leaders can protect these programs, and allow them to serve more people, by limiting the ability of the real estate industry to gouge tenants with extreme and unreasonable rent increases.

We urge you to report S1447 out favorably. Thank you for your time and consideration.

Respectfully submitted,

Victoria DiLorenzo
Housing Analyst
Massachusetts Budget and Policy Center

Endnotes

¹ American Community Survey, Table B25111, 5-year estimates. U.S. Census Bureau. Inflation data obtained from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

² DiLorenzo, V. 2025. Local Revenue is a Key Tool to Advance Housing Affordability. Massachusetts Budget and Policy Center. “Cost-burdened” is defined as spending more than 30 percent of one’s income on housing costs.

³ Voucher cost estimates provided by the Executive Office of Housing and Livable Communities.

⁴ Jankovic, M. 2024. Housing Stability Monitor: Massachusetts Evictions & Foreclosures. Massachusetts Housing Partnership.