Rents are likely to rise faster for older, class-B apartments in 2019 than for any other class of apartment property.
We expect Class-B to continue to have the strongest average rent growth, as it has through recent history,” says Andrew Rybczynski, senior consultant at research firm the CoStar Group.
Half of California’s renters spend more than 30 percent of their income on housing— housing experts call it “rent burdened.” A third of the state’s renters are considered “severely burdened” because they spend half of their paycheck on rent.
And rents in the state keep going up.
So, what rights do tenants have when the landlord asks for more?
KPBS’s Amita Sharma reached out to two experts for their perspective.
Hundreds of local renters are getting nervous after finding out their federal housing subsidies have expired in the wake of the government shutdown.
After three decades working as a legal secretary, Sandra Anderson retired but couldn't afford to live in San Diego. Fourteen years ago, she moved into a one-bedroom apartment in Columbia Tower downtown, which gets subsidies directly from the Department of Housing and Urban Development or HUD.
"I love it! I couldn't afford to live anywhere else," said Anderson.
The Committee to House the Bay Area (CASA) process has come to a close. The proposal will now move forward through the Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC), the Association of Bay Area Governments (ABAG), and the state legislature. The policies that come out of this process will impact housing, development, and displacement in the whole Bay Area and perhaps even the state.
The City Council has backed off plans to reinstate a temporary law prohibiting landlords from evicting tenants without cause.
The proposed just-cause eviction moratorium was approved as a stop-gap measure in a 4-3 vote earlier this month, but failed to muster enough council support to earn a second and final vote Tuesday evening.
For Iván Contreras, it’s normal to hear complaints about sudden rent increases from his neighbors; usually a couple of new people each month will reach out. But so far in January, Contreras, a housing organizer in Queens with community group Woodside on the Move, said it’s closer to a couple per day, all coming to him with notices from the state that their landlords performed “Major Capital Improvements,” or MCIs, and now want to increase their rent.
Patrick Greene could soon see his rent double.
The 70-year-old man lives with his wife, Karen, in a two-bedroom apartment in Montgomery, Alabama.
He pays $460 a month for the apartment, and the rest of his $940 rent is normally covered by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. Due to the stalemate in Washington, D.C., however, his landlord informed tenants that she hasn't received the government funds.
"We literally have no idea what's going to happen," Greene said, adding that he and wife live off around $1,500 a month.
Hundreds of low-income tenants at housing complexes in four states now face rent hikes thanks to the government shutdown.
A property management company told the tenants in a letter this week that because of the shutdown, the federal government is no longer subsidizing their rent.
“As of February 1, 2019, all tenants will be responsible for full basic rent,” said the letter, an image of which was tweeted Friday by a low-income housing advocate.
More than 50 people rallied in front of San Rafael City Hall on Monday demanding city officials adopt tighter renter protections as a planned 65 percent rent increase in the Canal area threatens to displace many long-term tenants.
The rent hikes were sent to residents by the new landlord of a 28-unit apartment complex on Dec. 1. Many residents received notices that their rent would increase by $900 or more, effective Feb. 1.
It was a stifling mid-August afternoon when Jennifer learned she had until the end of the year to move out of her cramped studio apartment in the East Village of downtown Long Beach. She suspected the eviction was coming. For the past year, she had been looking for a new place as her landlord slowly remodeled her modest building, the place she’s called home for more than 13 years. He knew she could not pay the increase in rent, so he told her it was time to go. Jennifer, who is in her 50s, qualified for Section 8 low-income housing and searched futilely for an opening in the area.