University Park Eviction Risk: Elevated

The strongest single driver of the headline number is tenant-organizing strength at 9.3/10. The poverty rate is 38%. Judgments in high-poverty tracts are collectible far less often than the filing statistics suggest.

Annualized rent equals 36% of average household income here, past the 30% affordability line, which compresses the margin any screening standard has to work with. Severe burden reaches 23%. A tenant at that level absorbs no shock: one cut shift or one repair bill converts directly into arrears.

Running hot is housing-court posture at 8.7/10. Cost burden runs 45% against 36.4% citywide, putting University Park 8.2% over its own city.

On the high side is economic stress at 8.5/10. Disability prevalence reaches 43.8% against a 31.5% national average, which raises the odds a reasonable-accommodation request accompanies any dispute. Among the 15 mapped neighborhoods of Gary, it ranks #1 by risk, the upper third.

For a like-for-like read, Horace Mann and Waverly Park score within a fraction of it. Social vulnerability runs high at 8.9/10, concentrating the disaster- and displacement-exposure this model treats as a lagging risk input. Its 4 tracts score within 0.5 points of one another, so the area figure travels well to individual addresses.

Average gross rent runs $1,053, close to the Gary average. 55% of occupied units are renter-occupied.

With little internal variation, 6/10 is a fair proxy for any address inside the boundary. The number is rebuilt whenever its ACS, court-record, or statutory inputs change.