What is the toll of eviction on a person’s spirit?

Although eviction affects individuals differently based on varying circumstances, through examining the accounts presented in Matthew Desmond's Evicted, we can conclude that extreme stress is common among eviction victims, and undoubtedly takes a toll on one's mental well-being. For households in which the majority of earnings must be directed towards rent, budgeting for groceries and other necessities is a constant nuisance, and fees resulting from late or non-payments quickly accumulate, increasing income inequality and reducing the attainability of financial security. The stressful toll of eviction is even greater on families with children, particularly in households headed by single mothers, who are less attractive to landlords and in some cases must resort to lying in order to secure housing. Arleen's stressful home life, the frequent changes in schools her children attend, and the choices she must make between which necessity to purchase, whether rent, school clothes, or funeral costs, all demonstrate stressful results of cyclical poverty and multiple evictions. Vanetta's case is particularly tragic, since after resorting to armed robbery to combat an eviction and possible loss of custody of her children, she is both evicted from her home and fired from her job. These accounts, as well as the other accounts provided in the book, demonstrate both the physical effects of eviction and the stressful realization of fears common to eviction victims, whose spirits and mental states are undoubtedly affected by such difficult circumstances.