Rent Parties

The Original Gangsta' of Mutual Aid

Community Care: The Throwback Edition

Rent Parties

During the Great Migration, Black folks headed North to escape the trash ass Jim Crow laws of the South. However, they still faced social and economic discrimination because, ‘merica. One way they were discriminated against was rental payments.

Black tenants were given smaller, cramped apartments, they were required to pay more for rent AND they made less money.

Enter, rent parties!

At first, the parties were hosted to make up for the difference in rent. But then, the parties became so popular that tenants started to host them to help supplement their salaries.

I love us for real.

This is community care.

I’ve been a renter for 30+ years. In that time there hasn’t been ONE month when I wasn’t concerned about how to pay rent.

Thanks to the care and support from this community, I’m close to paying my rent early for the first time ever in life ever. Seriously, forever ever.

For a person that…

👉🏽 Has poverty trauma
👉🏽 Has been homeless four times
👉🏽 Has lived with chronic housing insecurity

…this would be a MAJOR life milestone for me.


And remember: poor folks are never just putting out one fire. Instead, we focus our attention on the one that can fuck up our lives the most.

It’s daily crisis management that takes no days off. Those of you that that haven’t lived it will never understand the devastating impact it has on our mental, physical and emotional health.

Community care is where it’s at, we aren’t meant to do this alone.