Calcasieu Parish, Louisiana Eviction Risk: Low

Calcasieu Parish scores 3/10 on the eviction-risk index, placing it in the Low risk tier and in the middle third of Louisiana parishes. Of the 64 parishes ranked statewide, 24 are riskier and 39 are less risky, so landlords here face a moderately manageable operating environment rather than the extremes found elsewhere in Louisiana. Across the parish's 12 scored cities, average rent runs $1,114 per month, and about 32.9% of residents rent rather than own, giving investors a meaningful renter base to serve without the concentrated demand pressure that inflates eviction counts in high-risk markets.

The intra-county spread of 2.1 to 3.4 tells an important story: Calcasieu Parish is not a monolith. A landlord holding units in the parish's lowest-risk corridor operates in a fundamentally different environment from one concentrated in its highest-risk pockets, and picking the right submarket matters as much as picking the right property.

The cities inside Calcasieu Parish

At the high-risk end, Vinton and Starks both score 2.5/10, the highest readings in the parish. Vinton, with a population of 3,176, is a small community where a single difficult tenancy can meaningfully move local statistics, and landlords there should underwrite accordingly. Sulphur, the second-largest city in the parish at 20,775 residents, scores 3.5/10, the third-highest in the county, meaning its scale amplifies the elevated risk relative to smaller towns at similar scores.

At the other end of the spectrum, the parish seat of Lake Charles (population 81,143) scores 3.4/10, and Moss Bluff matches that reading at 2.1/10 despite a much smaller footprint of 12,482 residents. The gap between Lake Charles eviction risk and Vinton, both inside the same parish boundary, underscores how hyper-local eviction risk truly is; a county average captures the overall tenor but should never substitute for city-level due diligence before committing capital.

State-level laws that apply here

Every landlord in Calcasieu Parish operates under Louisiana state law. For nonpayment of rent or a lease violation, the required notice period is just 5 days under La. R.S. § 9:3251 et seq. (Louisiana Lease Law). A no-cause termination at the end of a lease term requires 30 days notice. Louisiana imposes no just-cause eviction requirement, and the state preempts local rent-control ordinances, so no Calcasieu Parish municipality can cap rents above what state law allows. Understanding the full Louisiana eviction process is worthwhile for any investor active in the parish, particularly around hearing schedules: uncontested matters typically resolve in 14 to 30 days, while contested cases can stretch to 30 to 90 days.

On the cost side, court filing fees run $170 to $300, sheriff lockout fees add another $50 to $175, and attorney fees, if needed, range from $500 to $3,000 depending on case complexity. Reviewing Louisiana eviction costs in full before budgeting any acquisition helps investors stress-test returns against a realistic worst-case scenario rather than an optimistic one.

With a parish-wide poverty rate of 19.4% and a rent-burden rate of 30.7%, some tenant financial fragility is present here, but the city grid above shows that risk concentrates in specific communities rather than spreading evenly, making targeted submarket selection the most effective risk-management tool available to Calcasieu Parish landlords.