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California Approves Statewide Rent Control

nytimes.com

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Re: California Approves Statewide Rent Control

#451

Post by fountainofage »

inferiorhuman wrote: post #383
ralusek wrote: post #357

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Housing in California is fixed because of zoning and construction regulations. Also, more people can't move here than can be supported...and how does putting arbitrary limits on maximum rent increase the amount of people that can live here if we're already dealing with the limitation of too many people wanting to live here? That will just increase the demand... Otherwise, there is a natural equilibrium. Many people w…

Housing in California is fixed because of zoning and construction regulations. And who decides these zoning laws? Typically cities and counties. Unfortunately Prop 13 has incentivized building out retail properties (sales tax revenue) over all else. So let's start by doing away with Prop. 13 protections for everything but primary residences. Then, change the statewide zoning laws to encourage/require available housin…

I mostly agree, but we should get rid of prop 13 completely. Just put a lien on the property rather than having the state seize the property if the "concern" is that we don't want people kicked out of their homes for property taxes.

Re: California Approves Statewide Rent Control

#452

Post by jeffdavis »

human20190310 wrote: post #322

There is no functioning market to begin with. Housing prices and rent are through the roof in California, yet supply is not rising to meet demand, largely because existing owners oppose new construction. Turnabout is fair play. If owners organize politically to control supply, tenants can organize politically to control prices.

> Turnabout is fair play.

The biggest myth is that this kind of stuff actually helps the less-powerful. In reality, it just means they are hurt twice: government artificially suppressing supply, and government manipulating prices which has bad side effects for mamy even if its good for a few.

Also, in reality, the powerful often don't get hurt, and arbitrary market manipulations just introduce new ways for them to get an advantage somehow.

Re: California Approves Statewide Rent Control

#453

Post by fountainofage »

aswanson wrote: post #364
zamfi wrote: post #355

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Housing in Silicon valley doesn't grow at the same rate as number of people coming here Bingo. And why not?

Existing homeowners don't want their living space turned into downtown Manhattan because there's a temporary exorbitant demand for ad click optimization and pic sharing networks.

Then they shouldn't vote in the office space?

Re: California Approves Statewide Rent Control

#454

Post by WWLink »

tomc1985 wrote: post #214
joshAg wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The entire point of the law is to prevent you from being able to make those larger adjustments, though. How often do you replace tenants? And what's your occupancy rate? If you're in a situation where you can reliably raise rent 7% YoY indefinitely without decreasing your occupancy rate, then you were severely underpriced for the market (and you should probably fire that management company for pricing you that absurd…

This makes me curious... is it the property management company or the landlord that sets the rental price? I recently rented a house and tried to haggle with the PM but they refused to budge on price but were willing to negotiate on other factors (like lease term and property rules), which made me wonder if the PM's hands were tied re: price.

Some PMs will try to act the opposite, but if you're the property owner, you're HIRING the property manager to find you tenants and/or manage the rental process. Their responsibilities are defined in the property management contract.

Sadly, their contracts are pretty slimy - they usually absolve the property manager of any wrongdoing whatsoever. Do they hold up in court? KINDA. Unless you're incredibly rich and have a fantastic lawyer.

Re: California Approves Statewide Rent Control

#455

Post by ravenstine »

dgzl wrote: post #409
human20190310 wrote: post #377

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It hurts the owners who would be receiving the wealthy newcomers' money. It doesn't solve anything directly, but it's an attack on the prosperity of the people who are maintaining artificial restrictions on new construction. A laissez-faire approach to both construction and rent would probably be a better option. But that's already not happening, and it's not going to happen without pressuring homeowners and landlord…

Construction isn't easy anymore. we've taxed and regulated it into a luxury.

Lots of developers choose to build luxury buildings because it can take several years for the construction to be approved. We could build more starter homes like we used to, but it's hardly worth it for developers.

Re: California Approves Statewide Rent Control

#457

Post by joshAg »

cookiecaper wrote: post #399
jacobolus wrote: post #345

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So in other words, landlords love to reserve the right to kick a tenant they stop liking out at the drop of a hat for no specific reason, by jacking the rent up as high as they want. As compensation for this power, they are willing to charge well below market rates to help indigent tenants. If they lose this “right”, they insist on becoming pure profit maximizing machines?

> So in other words, landlords love to reserve the right to kick a tenant they stop liking out at the drop of a hat for no specific reason, by jacking the rent up as high as they want. It's disingenuous to pretend like the landlord is the only party with any control. Landlords cannot remove a tenant at "the drop of a hat" by any stretch of the imagination, nor can they arbitrarily increase rental prices. Rentals usua…

>>> (If you're in California, you should also know that the new law punishes your landlord for trying to do you a solid and keep your rent stable across lease terms.)

The CA law allows the rental price to reset to market rate for a new tenant, so unless the landlord doing you a solid was planning to stick you specifically with a rent increase down the line to recapture the present solid, they can still keep your rent stable across lease terms.

Re: California Approves Statewide Rent Control

#458

Post by claudeganon »

manfredo wrote: post #411
claudeganon wrote: post #332

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It doesn’t. The landlord captures increases in value from things like better public infrastructure or outside economic development in the same fashion. Tech workers in San Francisco, for example, have created massive amounts of wealth and value in the city, much of which has then been sucked up by landlords and developers who provide nothing even remotely comparable. They just profit from owning something other peopl…

> They just profit from owning something other people do work and build on top of. The same way people who own shares in a company that pays dividends profit from work other people do. Those landlords either built the apartment buildings themselves, or spent the capital investment to buy the building from a previous owner. (to your comment below, HN isn't letting me respond) So in the end, this isn't about the busine…

I agree! That money should all be going back to the workers instead too ;)

Re: California Approves Statewide Rent Control

#459

Post by human20190310 »

AmericanChopper wrote: post #442
human20190310 wrote: post #322

There is no functioning market to begin with. Housing prices and rent are through the roof in California, yet supply is not rising to meet demand, largely because existing owners oppose new construction. Turnabout is fair play. If owners organize politically to control supply, tenants can organize politically to control prices.

> yet supply is not rising to meet demand, largely because existing owners oppose new construction. So when over-regulation drives up prices, the appropriate response is to introduce new regulations to fight the other regulations? Because that’s exactly what this is. It won’t even improve the problem. The problem is that there are more people who want to live in California than there is housing. The reason for that i…

> So when over-regulation drives up the costs, the appropriate response is to introduce new regulations to fight the other regulations?

Yes. The effort to reduce regulations on construction has failed. As such, retaliating against the beneficiaries of those regulations with counter-regulations is appropriate.

It's not pretty or efficient, this is a fight between different interests, not a group problem-solving effort.

Re: California Approves Statewide Rent Control

#460

Post by KibbutzDalia »

inferiorhuman wrote: post #358
zamfi wrote: post #355

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Housing in Silicon valley doesn't grow at the same rate as number of people coming here Bingo. And why not?

Bingo. And why not? Because California property owners don't want it to. The artificial scarcity drives up property values. Take a look at Brisbane, they fought residential development tooth and nail claiming that people should just work in Brisbane but live in San Francisco.

Not true. We have a house and commercial rental property in Sunnyvale California. I’d love to tear down my commercial building and build something with an additional story but zoning won’t allow it. And is welcome all single family zoning being upgraded to 2 family zoning. I’d build a second unit in a heartbeat.
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