home liberation
An issue of unprecedented scale
During course of the United States’ most recent foreclosure crisis, more than 10 million people were evicted from their homes between the years 2007 and 2013 alone.[1] Because of explicitly discriminatory lending and mortgage practices, this crisis hit communities of color particularly hard.[2] After these millions of occupants - tenants and homeowners alike - were evicted, most of their former homes became bank-owned properties and were left vacant. In many cities across the country, clusters of these newly vacant structures continue to serve as a visible reminder of the (in many ways still ongoing) housing crisis. Though legally compelled to maintain these repossessed homes, many banks have not done so, and have instead boarded up the buildings and left them to deteriorate, especially in communities of color.[3]
Their windows and doors blocked with large pieces of plywood, these vacant properties have been symbolically removed from the city’s fabric, having become spaces where people ostensibly should not be. Though the buildings still occupy physical space, those spaces no longer have any officially dictated purpose and is therefore transformed from functional to residual. Indeed, the removal of these vacant structures from the urban fabric is so complete that in Chicago firefighters were instructed via spray-painted ‘X’s that it was unnecessary to enter them in the event of a fire.[4] Thus, these homes are paradoxically erased from the city in a highly visible manner.
Their windows and doors blocked with large pieces of plywood, these vacant properties have been symbolically removed from the city’s fabric, having become spaces where people ostensibly should not be. Though the buildings still occupy physical space, those spaces no longer have any officially dictated purpose and is therefore transformed from functional to residual. Indeed, the removal of these vacant structures from the urban fabric is so complete that in Chicago firefighters were instructed via spray-painted ‘X’s that it was unnecessary to enter them in the event of a fire.[4] Thus, these homes are paradoxically erased from the city in a highly visible manner.
responding with home liberations
This online space looks at one particular response to this drastic change in urban landscapes across the country, one way that people took it upon themselves to repurpose these residual spaces and, by doing so, staked their claim to the city – home liberation.
the practice itself
Home liberation has been practiced by a number of organizations across the country, among them Take Back the Land Miami and the Chicago Anti-Eviction Campaign. At its most fundamental level, the practice involves moving into a vacant home without the legal title to do so. A primary important step in home liberation is a pre-move-in neighborhood canvassing. Before helping people move in to a vacant home, organizers go door-to-door asking residents if they would be supportive of people moving into the community’s vacant homes, particularly given the knowledge that these neighbors would not pay rent or a mortgage for their new homes.[5] The Anti-Eviction Campaign added the canvassing step after one home liberation, in a relatively wealthier neighborhood, was thwarted by disapproving neighbors, who alerted police.[6]
Given the deteriorating condition of many foreclosed properties – including those that have already been stripped of appliances and even pipes – participants in home liberations often make extensive repairs to their new homes before or during the move-in process.[7] Diligently recording this repair work is a critical aspect of the process for the Anti-Eviction Campaign, who contend that in the event of legal action they will petition for reimbursement of these costs.[8] This recordkeeping includes photographing the building’s initial condition and keeping all receipts for materials purchased. One woman working with the Anti-Eviction Campaign, Martha Biggs, estimated that the labor and materials she had invested in her liberated home amounted to around $9,000.[9] These significant costs are often born by new residents or organizers – Laura Gottesdiener reported that Anti-Eviction Campaign organizers funded their house rehabbing by pawning personal belongings.[10] Other costs include water, electric, and gas utilities, which Take Back the Land Miami asks new residents to contribute.[11]
Given the deteriorating condition of many foreclosed properties – including those that have already been stripped of appliances and even pipes – participants in home liberations often make extensive repairs to their new homes before or during the move-in process.[7] Diligently recording this repair work is a critical aspect of the process for the Anti-Eviction Campaign, who contend that in the event of legal action they will petition for reimbursement of these costs.[8] This recordkeeping includes photographing the building’s initial condition and keeping all receipts for materials purchased. One woman working with the Anti-Eviction Campaign, Martha Biggs, estimated that the labor and materials she had invested in her liberated home amounted to around $9,000.[9] These significant costs are often born by new residents or organizers – Laura Gottesdiener reported that Anti-Eviction Campaign organizers funded their house rehabbing by pawning personal belongings.[10] Other costs include water, electric, and gas utilities, which Take Back the Land Miami asks new residents to contribute.[11]
reactions
Though home liberations are certainly illegal, even making these actions public has not always brought swift responses from authorities. In 2008, an Associated Press article on Take Back the Land Miami quoted a Miami spokeswoman who clearly noted that enforcement of trespassing laws would only occur if there were a complaint from the property owner.[12] In 2009, another article noted that the city’s police chief had publicly stated his disinterest in proactively hindering home liberators.[13] Around that same time, organizer Max Rameau gave an interview in which he noted that this lack of aggressive policing was likely tied to the public’s dissatisfaction with housing vacancy and bank bailouts.[14] Still, organizers were cognizant of the increased risks of police intervention that publicity inevitably brought, and for that reason, chose to keep many of their home liberations out of the spotlight.[15] The Chicago Anti-Eviction Campaign negotiates directly with banks after moving people into their properties, often succeeding in securing their agreement for the new residents to stay in exchange for cleaning up the property – the bank’s oft-neglected legal responsibility.[16] However, not all responses were quite so amicable. When the former owners of a foreclosed property in Minneapolis organized alongside others to reclaim their home from a bank, the ensuing, protracted conflict with police forces cost a reported $42,000 in public funds.[17]
by another name
Home liberation, of course, could also be referred to as squatting – a broader term that signifies any illegal occupation of a place, and is likely quietly on the rise across the country.[18] Because of its illegality, squatting is generally an activity conducted discreetly so as to avoid detection by authorities, who would enforce property rights. While not all home liberations are publicized, they are distinguishable from squatting in that they are connected to a concrete set of political claims. Facilitating the take-overs of foreclosed properties, organizers, including Max Rameau of Take Back the Land, and J.R. Fleming of the Anti-Eviction Campaign, used this work to vocalize and highlight the failures of the city and to illustrate alternatives.
Political claims
“We are asserting that the right of human beings to housing supersedes the right of corporations to make a profit.” – Max Rameau[19]
“We’re challenging amoral laws by breaking them.” – J.R. Fleming[20]
“We’re challenging amoral laws by breaking them.” – J.R. Fleming[20]
Though reticent to limit the potential of their actions with a concrete list of demands, Rameau, Fleming, and other organizers are clear in their overarching objective to shift societal values around privatization, by asserting the salience of people’s right to housing.[21] Their public actions served to highlight the “the failures of government in providing adequate housing.”[22]
By 2011, Take Back the Land Miami was no longer conducting home liberations. Rameau and other core organizers, however, have remained active in the nationwide actions against banks, including collaborating with the Occupy Movement on similar actions.[23]
By 2011, Take Back the Land Miami was no longer conducting home liberations. Rameau and other core organizers, however, have remained active in the nationwide actions against banks, including collaborating with the Occupy Movement on similar actions.[23]
decommodifying homes
“Because attitudes toward markets are so myopic, any social intervention in those contexts runs a heavy risk of generating hostility. This lack of understanding of markets leads to an ongoing ideological asymmetry between those struggling over use and exchange, with those pursuing exchange having the advantage.” - John Logan & Harvey Molotch, Urban Fortunes
John Logan’s and Harvey Molotch’s chapter “Places as Commodities” – from their book Urban Fortunes – offers a useful framework for thinking through the significance of home liberation. Essentially, these actions render visible what Logan and Molotch refer to as the “internal struggle between use and exchange values” – thus challenging onlookers to intellectually engage with this struggle.[24] Here, 'use value' signifies both the material and psychological characteristics of a place, while 'exchange value' signifies its assigned monetary value in the market. When moving people into vacant, bank-owned properties and proclaiming the overriding right to housing, activists confront the dominance of exchange value in determining a place’s use. These actions assert that the ability to extract rent from a home’s occupants should not be the sole determinant of its use, that unaffordable mortgages are not an excuse for leaving homes vacant amidst widespread homelessness. By simply carrying out these home liberations and in some cases provoking police intervention, organizers and participants also illuminate the fragility of exchange value – illustrating its reliance on governmental enforcement. As Logan and Molotch write, “without such governmental “regulation” there could be no exchange of place at all.”[25] Of course, it is worth consideration that participants’ claims to the use values of these homes do not threaten the buildings’ immediate exchange value, because by virtue of their vacancy the homes are not producing profit in the first place. The threat of these actions lies not in derailing individual transactions, but in challenging the rules that govern housing in the United States. By brazenly breaking laws and therefore challenging authorities to intervene in these situations, where there is no existing exchange value to be threatened, home liberations highlight the irrationality of de-prioritizing the use value of homes. They call into question a system that renders homes useless when they do not produce “sufficient” rents, when many people simultaneously struggle without a place to live.
works cited
1. Goodman, A., & Gottesdiener, L. (2013, August 6). A Dream Foreclosed: As Obama Touts Recovery, New Book Reveals Racist Roots of Housing Crisis.
2. Rameau, M. (2012). Take Back the Land. AK Press. 8.
3. The Banks Are Back - Our Neighborhoods Are Not. (2012).
4. Austen, B. (2013, May 29). The Death and Life of Chicago. The New York Times Magazine.
5. Ibid.
6. Nolan, R. (2013, June 3). Behind the Cover Story: Ben Austen on Reclaiming Abandoned Homes. The New York Times.
7. Austen, B.
8. Gunaratna, S. (2013, June 30). Chicago Anti-Evictions Campaign featured on Chicago PBS station WTTW. NESRI Media Center.
9. Austen, B.
10. Gottesdiener, L. (2012). Chicago’s Quiet Home-Liberation Front.
11. Homeless Turn Foreclosures Into Shelters. (2008, December 11). USA Today.
12. Activist Moves Homeless Into Foreclosures. (2008, December 1). ABC News.
13. Thomas, J. (2009, June 23). All-American Squatters. In These Times.
14. Goodman, A., & Rameau, M. (2008, December 19). Take Back the Land: Miami Grassroots Group Moves Struggling Families into Vacant Homes.
15. Rameau, M. 50.
16. Gunaratna, S.
17. Roper, E. (2012, June 14). Police Cost of Cedar Ave. Foreclosure Standoffs: $42k. StarTribune.
18. Activist Moves Homeless Into Foreclosures.
19. Goodman, A., & Rameau, M.
20. Austen, B.
21. Gottesdiener, L. (2012, May 13). Grabbing the Bolt-Cutters With Take Back the Land. Huffington Post.
22. Rameau, M. 50.
23. Sledge, M. (2011, December 6). Occupy Our Homes: Take Back the Land Has Lessons For Home 'Liberators' Huffington Post.
24. Logan, J. and Molotch, H. (1987/2007). “Places as Commodities” from Urban Fortunes: The political economy of place.
25. Ibid.
2. Rameau, M. (2012). Take Back the Land. AK Press. 8.
3. The Banks Are Back - Our Neighborhoods Are Not. (2012).
4. Austen, B. (2013, May 29). The Death and Life of Chicago. The New York Times Magazine.
5. Ibid.
6. Nolan, R. (2013, June 3). Behind the Cover Story: Ben Austen on Reclaiming Abandoned Homes. The New York Times.
7. Austen, B.
8. Gunaratna, S. (2013, June 30). Chicago Anti-Evictions Campaign featured on Chicago PBS station WTTW. NESRI Media Center.
9. Austen, B.
10. Gottesdiener, L. (2012). Chicago’s Quiet Home-Liberation Front.
11. Homeless Turn Foreclosures Into Shelters. (2008, December 11). USA Today.
12. Activist Moves Homeless Into Foreclosures. (2008, December 1). ABC News.
13. Thomas, J. (2009, June 23). All-American Squatters. In These Times.
14. Goodman, A., & Rameau, M. (2008, December 19). Take Back the Land: Miami Grassroots Group Moves Struggling Families into Vacant Homes.
15. Rameau, M. 50.
16. Gunaratna, S.
17. Roper, E. (2012, June 14). Police Cost of Cedar Ave. Foreclosure Standoffs: $42k. StarTribune.
18. Activist Moves Homeless Into Foreclosures.
19. Goodman, A., & Rameau, M.
20. Austen, B.
21. Gottesdiener, L. (2012, May 13). Grabbing the Bolt-Cutters With Take Back the Land. Huffington Post.
22. Rameau, M. 50.
23. Sledge, M. (2011, December 6). Occupy Our Homes: Take Back the Land Has Lessons For Home 'Liberators' Huffington Post.
24. Logan, J. and Molotch, H. (1987/2007). “Places as Commodities” from Urban Fortunes: The political economy of place.
25. Ibid.