Free Republic

When the New York legislature passed major changes to the state's rent regulations in June 2019, critics warned the new law would reduce investment in, and renovations of, rental properties in New York City. Six months later, those predictions are bearing out. Bloomberg reported this morning that sales of apartment buildings in the Big Apple fell by 36 percent in 2019, and that the money spent on those sales fell by 40 percent. The prices investors were paying for rent-stabilized units—where allowable rent increases are set by the government and usually capped at around 1 or 2 percent per year—fell...

As reported by the LA Times, according to data recently released by the Department of Finance, CaliforniaÂ’s population growth rate for the year ending July 1, 2019, was the lowest the state has experienced since 1900. Estimates indicate the Golden StateÂ’s population grew by 0.35 percent over the course of the year (or by 141,000 people), down from 0.57 percent for the previous year ending July 1, 2018. CaliforniaÂ’s growth in population was buoyed by the net difference between births and deaths in the state, which amounted to 180,800 people. However, this number was tempered by net losses in migration,...

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., is promoting a new package of left-wing economic policies, including national rent control and expanding welfare to illegal immigrants across the country, as part of a massive new proposal aiming to achieve a “just society.” The freshman lawmaker, who champions the multi-trillion-dollar Green New Deal proposal to combat economic inequality and climate change, has now proposed a package of bills aimed at solving perceived economic injustice. “A just society provides a living wage, safe working conditions, and healthcare. A just society acknowledges the value of immigrants to our communities. A just society guarantees safe, comfortable, and...

California lawmakers approved a statewide rent cap on Wednesday covering millions of tenants, the biggest step yet in a surge of initiatives to address an affordable-housing crunch nationwide. The bill limits annual rent increases to 5 percent after inflation and offers new barriers to eviction, providing a bit of housing security in a state with the nation’s highest housing prices and a swelling homeless population. Gov. Gavin Newsom, a Democrat who has made tenant protection a priority in his first year in office, led negotiations to strengthen the legislation. He has said he would sign the bill, approved as part...

The Trump administration just issued a draft rule that would prevent illegal immigrants from claiming federal housing subsidies. The reform will help ensure that taxpayer dollars only go to needy American families. Though welcome and much needed, the rule doesn’t address the root of the problem — the widespread lack of affordable housing in this country. More than 10 million Americans depend on federal welfare programs to pay rent. Tens of millions more qualify for such assistance but don’t receive any help due to programs’ budget constraints. America’s immigration laws deserve part of the blame for this sorry state of...

A California bill aimed at applying rent control across the state is set to receive its first hearing in the state Senate. The Senate Judiciary Committee will consider AB 1482 by Assemblyman David Chiu, D-San Francisco on July 9th. The proposed bill would apply rent control to all types of housing in every city and county in California. The bill surfaced despite the overwhelming defeat of Proposition 10, a statewide rent control bill on last November’s ballot. The California Apartment Association remains opposed to the bill, despite several amendments promised by Chiu, Including ...

In promising to sign a dumb and destructive bill to immortalize rent regulation — a step that will keep tenants who pay artificially low rents in over 1 million apartments from ever giving them up — Gov. Andrew Cuomo has basically told everyone else in New York City to go to hell. It makes it likely that no new apartment buildings will rise. It guarantees that existing ones will decay. It will make repairs and upgrades prohibitively expensive for landlords who must eke out puny profits from properties that require major reinvestment, but where they can’t charge enough rent to...

Big apartment owners are forecast to post strong earnings when they start reporting this week, but a number of state-sponsored rent-control measures are starting to raise longer-term concerns. While most of the dozen or so proposals aimed at curbing rent increases are in their early stages, some states have already taken action. Oregon passed a law in February that capped rent increases to 7% plus the local inflation rate. Democrats in the Colorado legislature introduced a bill this month to repeal a longstanding ban on rent control, which would allow local governments to set their own rent limits. New York...

Last week, Oregon became the first state in the nation to adopt a mandatory statewide rent control policy. Yet, rent control never delivers on the promise that it will multiply the affordable housing in high-value markets to serve middle- and lower-class families. It also always has negative consequences, and this time will be no different. The new statewide law applies to landlords who have at least four units, one of which is at least 15 years old. It prohibits them from increasing rent more than seven percent over inflation annually. The bill also prohibits no-cause evictions after the first year...

SALEM, Ore. (AP) — Faced with a housing shortage and skyrocketing rents, Oregon is poised to become the first state to impose mandatory rent controls, with a measure establishing tenant protections moving swiftly through the Legislature. Many residents have testified in favor of the legislation, describing anxiety and hardship as they face higher rents. Some have gone up by as much as almost 100 percent — forcing people to move, stay with friends or even live in their vehicles. The town of Medford recently authorized churches to offer car camping for the homeless on their parking lots. Cities across the...

Oregon will soon be the first state to have a statewide rent control program. Last week, in my first week at Cascade Policy Institute, I testified in opposition to the rent control bill, SB 608. The bill has the support of the Governor Kate Brown, House Speaker Tina Kotek, and Senate President Peter Courtney. About 100 people signed up to testify, and supporters outnumbered opponents by 2-to-1. It’s a done deal and it’s a bad deal. During World War II, the federal government instituted a national system of rent controls, establishing maximum rents for rental properties. New York City was...

Rent control is a classic example of the law of unintended consequences. When Californians scan their ballots for the November 6 election and consider Proposition 10, which would allow local governments to impose and expand rent control laws, they should consider the long-term harms the measure would inflict on housing quantity, quality, and affordability. Rent control is a textbook example of a price ceiling, in which prices are capped below market rates (i.e., where supply and demand are left free to interact). As those Econ 101 textbooks will show you, many more people will demand housing at these lower prices,...

A costly and potentially bruising campaign is taking shape over rent control in California, with deep-pocketed Los Angeles activist Michael Weinstein bankrolling a proposed November ballot initiative to repeal a state law that sets tight limits on the type of housing covered under local rent control laws. “Nobody’s fighting for the tenant,” said Weinstein, president of AIDS Healthcare Foundation, who partly funded the Proposition 61, the 2016 fight over prescription drug costs that became the most expensive initiative that year, with total spending at roughly $130 million. As California confronts a historic housing crisis, low- and middle-income renters are being...

California's Democrats are trying to take us once again The definition of insanity is to repeat the same mistake over and over again, while hoping for a different, better outcome. Such is the latest case of the predictable Left, turning once again to another failed sociological experiment—capping or regulating rents artificially, more commonly known as “Rent Control.” Democrats in California are once again imposing rent control initiatives through state and local ballot measures, including the Sacramento Renter Protection And Community Stabilization Charter Amendment. The effects of rent control only become worse the longer the rent control continues. Rent control is...

As any New Yorker knows, finding an apartment is not easy. The city’s affordable housing lottery was set up to assist residents, but applying for the lottery takes time and patience. Brooklyn resident Maria Martinez told PIX11 she’s been applying faithfully for 20 years, since the inception of the lottery program. Speaking through a translator, she said the process is frustrating. “You keep applying. You hope you end up with a home, but it hasn’t happened for me yet,” Martinez said. Martinez currently rents a one-bedroom apartment in Williamsburg. She lives with her husband and two teenage children. “Sometimes I...

Yesica Sanchez recently found a notice attached to the front door of her two-bedroom apartment that said her rent was almost doubling. The divorced mother held the paper in her hand in a state of shock. […] Oregon has become one of America’s most popular moving destinations, with tens of thousands of newcomers each year drawn by its forests and mountains, its quirky city of Portland and its job opportunities. Oregon set a historical low jobless rate in March of 3.8 percent. But the inflow has caused a rental housing crisis across the state, with too few homes being built....

Calls for rent control are heating up across the Gilded State, and not just from Silicon Valley either. From Santa Rosa to San Diego to Alameda to even Sacramento, we are seeing the affordable housing rhetoric move even deeper into the suburbs. Where once rent control was the province of high density urban areas, it is becoming the next new push for the entitlement generation. Simply put, there are more voters as renters than landlords. One thing government has become very good at as of late, especially in California, is beating up the ballot box minority. Business owners are not...

Santa Monica topped notoriously expensive San Francisco and New York City to claim the highest rent prices in America according to a report from rental website Apartment Guide. The coastal city led all other markets with average rent prices of $4,799 for a one-bedroom unit, with Venice not far behind at No. 5 with mean prices around $3,923. Both topped San Francisco, which came in at No. 6 with average rents of $3,880. New York City took second place with mean rents at $4,563, followed by nearby Long Beach, New York, and Great Neck, New York, at Nos. 3 and...

It is especially painful for me, as an economist, to see that two small cities in northern California — San Mateo and Burlingame — have rent control proposals on the ballot this election year. There are various other campaigns, in other places around the country, for and against minimum wage laws, which likewise make me wonder if the economics profession has failed to educate the public in the most elementary economic lessons. Neither rent control nor minimum wage laws — nor price control laws in general — are new. Price control laws go back as far as ancient Egypt and...

Charles Edwards is a merry self-described hillbilly from Tennessee who knows much about Victorian-era railroads and not so much about political campaigning. But this year, the 77-year-old retired city gardener will be knocking on doors in Alameda to persuade voters of this maritime city on San Francisco Bay to support a citizen initiative to cap rent increases. Last June, the rent on his one-bedroom flat increased 24 percent to $1,300, leaving him $289 a month for utilities, food and other expenses. […] State legislation approved last week to raise the state’s minimum wage to $15 an hour by 2022 is...