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By Elise Kaplan / Journal Staff Writer Published: Saturday, July 16th, 2022 at 10:05PM Updated: Sunday, July 17th, 2022 at 12:05AM

When Andrea Perez and her longtime boyfriend moved from a one-bedroom apartment in Albuquerque to a mobile home in Rio Rancho almost four years ago, it felt like a big step up.

“This was way bigger – having a two-bedroom and our own living room, you know? The kid having his own room was a big deal,” Perez said, referring to her grandson who was living with her at the time. “It was nice. I mean, it wasn’t an apartment. It was just an actual home. It was enclosed. It was perfect.”

But over the past couple of months their living situation has quickly unraveled.

The couple was evicted and moved out May 24. Ever since, Perez has been living out of her Jeep Cherokee. Her boyfriend, who has health issues, is staying with his sister.

At night, 43-year-old Perez parks at a Walmart or a hospital and sleeps in the driver’s seat – rigging blankets over the windows for privacy. In her trunk are suitcases with her belongings and a cooler for food and water. A heart-shaped locket containing her father’s ashes hangs from the rearview mirror.

News reports suggest that across the country the number of people who are homeless is rising.

And Alexandra Paisano, the director of Albuquerque Coordinated Entry System for the New Mexico Coalition to End Homelessness, said the agency is hearing from a lot of people who have never been homeless before.

“We get those phone calls pretty much every day, multiple times a day, where people just recently became homeless within the past couple days or they’re going to be homeless within the next couple of days,” Paisano said. “They’re calling, they’re desperate, they need a place to go.”

Unfortunately, she said, there are not a lot of options for immediate help. She said homeless families are eligible for some programs, but there are often waitlists and they’re not available for everyone.

“That’s the only option – trying to go to a shelter,” Paisano said. “People get upset about that. It’s a choice people are going to have to make and none of the choices are going to be good, you have to go to a shelter or you’ll be in your car if you’re lucky enough to have one, or maybe in the streets.”

After the COVID-19 pandemic began in 2020 Perez lost her job at a Speedway gas station. She received unemployment insurance for a while, then got another job – this time working from home providing customer support for people with questions about Medicare. When she lost that job, too, she started working at an Allsup’s.

In mid-January, fearing that she wouldn’t be able to make her $800 monthly rent, Perez applied for help through the New Mexico Department of Finance and Administration’s Emergency Rental Assistance Program. She’d previously been awarded six months rent through the program.

Almost two months later, in early March, Perez was awarded four months rent – $3,600. But her landlady returned the check to the program.

And then she terminated the month-to-month lease, citing the fact that the couple had let Perez’s daughter and Perez’s daughter’s boyfriend and baby stay at the home even though they weren’t on the lease. She also said she saw two cats that appeared to live at the home even though animals are prohibited.

In an interview with the Journal, Gloria Sosa said she owns three mobile homes in the area.

She said she had wanted to work with Perez and her boyfriend, especially when they had their grandson living with them, but the situation became untenable. She said since the couple began living there they were late paying rent 17 times and became confrontational when she asked about it.

Sosa said the rental assistance program told her if she accepted their check, Perez and her boyfriend would get to live there for three more months and she didn’t want that.

“She was letting some other family stay there since the little grandson wasn’t there no more. And I didn’t find that out till later,” Sosa said, referring to Perez’s daughter and her family.

Through measures meant to ease the economic effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, the state received two rounds of funding from the federal government to help people pay rent or utilities – totaling $170 million.

The money that is doled out is not a loan and does not need to be repaid.

Henry Valdez, a spokesman for the Emergency Rental Assistance Program, said as of July 14 the program had made 61,041 awards totaling $145,586,084. He said 92.1% of applicants are awarded funding, although it can take a month or two for them to be approved.

Valdez could not provide figures Friday on what percentage of those who are awarded funding do not actually receive the assistance.

“Funds can be returned for various reasons, but we will recirculate those funds into our available grants later in the program,” he said.

As for Perez, Valdez said there was nothing the program could do to help since her lease was terminated for issues other than not paying rent.

“We really can’t do anything if they’re evicted, or if it’s not because of nonpayment, or … if it’s still in accordance with their lease,” Valdez said. “So if they’re like in a month-to-month, or they break the lease in other capacities. Like there’s nothing we could do about that.”

He said the program always tries to pay the landlord directly but if the landlord refuses a check there is a way it can be given directly to the tenant.

However in this instance, since Perez was no longer at the home she couldn’t get it.

“The applicant called the program and asked for the award to be reissued to her for another rental, but this isn’t allowed under federal guidelines,” Valdez said. “Awards are for specific rental agreements as the eligibility determination is based on and approved for that specific rental agreement. She indicated that she was no longer living at the property so we couldn’t issue a check directly.”

Valdez suggested she apply for the Hotel Assistance Program or the Relocation Assistance Program instead.

“We continue to look for ways to expand the program and help more renters in difficult situations, like the creation of HAP, RAP and our partnership with the Eviction Diversion Program,” Valdez said. “Unfortunately, some situations are beyond the scope of ERAP and fall within the current landlord/tenant laws.”

Perez spoke with the Journal last week while sitting at a picnic table at the rolling Rio Rancho park where her grandson used to play baseball a couple of years ago.

Every surrounding street is lined with $300,000 to $400,000 two-story homes.

Perez had a hard childhood, growing up in Albuquerque, and said she took care of her grandmother until she left home at about 15.

“I got married at a young age and met my kids’ dad when I was 15,” Perez said. “I was with him for 10 years and that didn’t work out. Just going from relationship to relationship like all I do is take care of people.”

Her daughter and grandson are now staying with her other daughter but there’s not enough room for the whole family there. Everyone is struggling. Their stuff is in storage.

“I miss being able to cook. I’m constantly trying to stay clean, because that’s all I do,” Perez said. “I always clean when I’m at home, and I clean out my car. And it’s really, really hard. It takes a lot out of you to sit here and deal with something like this. I don’t even know how I’m dealing with it.”

She lost her job at Allsup’s when she kept having to leave early due to the circumstances around the eviction.

Her Jeep was side-swiped on the passenger side shortly after she started living in it, and although it still runs, a front panel has been removed revealing the inner workings. She’s worried about driving too far from home – such as toward the Westside Emergency Housing Center – and then getting stranded if she runs out of gas.

Perez said she now spends her days making calls and trying to get vouchers. She washes up in public bathrooms.

“You keep hearing ‘no, no, no’ or ‘there’s a waiting list,’ ” she said. “You get tired of it. The past couple of days, I’ve just given myself a break from everything and tried just to not do anything. But then this gets to me – sitting in the car, you know, all day long. It’s like, how am I going to eat tonight? How am I going to do this tonight? It’s just frustrating.”