by Mary Stroka
The rent delinquency rate decreased in Minnesota in September compared to August, Alignable reported.
From Sept. 16 to Sept. 29, the online referral network for small businesses polled 4,232 randomly selected small business owners across the country.
The company heard from 252 Minnesota-based small businesses, Head of Public Relations Chuck Castro told The Center Square in an email. The poll found that 33% of those Minnesota businesses couldn’t pay rent in September, down from 34% in August, he said.
The national average is 30%, which is down from 40% in August. The August figure was a peak in rent delinquency over at least the past year, he said. The record low, 26%, during and after the pandemic was in December 2021.
“Minnesota’s small businesses continue to have trouble bouncing back from high inflation, other higher-than-usual costs and spiking rents,” Castro said.
The report showed that rent delinquency for small businesses is higher in Illinois (39%), New York (39%) and Massachusetts (36%) compared with Minnesota. Illinois’ rent delinquency is down 14 percentage points from August. In that month, 53% of small businesses couldn’t pay rent.
However, Pennsylvania and Colorado each saw 22% rent delinquency, the report said.
Reasons for the national decrease included more revenue coming in for more businesses, businesses’ raising prices to bolster their margins, seniors’ side gigs paying more expenses and decreases in gas prices, the report said. Nationally, 29% of small businesses said they had earned as much, if not more, monthly as they did before the pandemic.
On the national level, small businesses in the education industry had the highest rate of rent delinquency compared with other industries, at 44%, the survey found. Education had no change from last month.
Real estate companies, at 27%, had the lowest rate. Local musicians and artists’ rent delinquency rate increased 9%, while the other industries’ rates decreased.
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Mary Stroka is a contributor to The Center Square.
