To renovate an apartment — and not jack up the rent: These property owners have found a way

Los Angeles Times ^ | Oct. 3, 2024 3 AM PT | Andrew Khouri and Ben Poston

[E. Pluribus Unum]

To pay just $770 a month in rent, Mariana Puche Hernandez tolerated the mold growing in the bathroom of her studio apartment, even the sparks that flew when she plugged her phone into an outlet.

Then the 11-unit complex on Simmons Avenue in East L.A. went up for sale and became a prime target for investors looking to renovate apartments and hike the rent beyond what residents could afford.

“There was panic,” Puche Hernandez said.

Across the nation, the United States is losing thousands of homes affordable to low-income families as individual investors and large companies buy older apartment buildings to renovate and sharply raise rent. The investments have sparked concerns over gentrification, displacement and homelessness.

But affordable housing advocates say there doesn’t have be a choice between renovation and affordable rent. A number of models exist to repair older properties and keep rents low — including nonprofit ownership and certain bond financing programs. They just need public subsidies and the political will to preserve them or get new ones off the ground.

“These units are important to save,” said Matt Alvarez-Nissen, a researcher with the nonprofit California Housing Partnership.

That’s because only 16% of low-income California tenants have a home where government policy limits rents based on income, according to the partnership. The rest, 2.9 million households, live in unsubsidized units subject to the whims of the private market. Rent control laws help some of those tenants from seeing enormous rent increase each year, but the laws don’t mandate affordability.

[E. Pluribus Unum]

To renovate an apartment — and not jack up the rent... they just need public subsidies...

I would call Andy and Benny mental midgets, but that would be an insult to little people.

[TornadoAlley3]

Stay Poor!

Vote Democrat!

[PGR88]

They just need - FREE GOVERNMENT MONEY passed out to eligible cronies.

[for-q-clinton]

They just need public subsidies

Uh what part of subsidies do they not understand. That is raising the price just everyone else is paying for it.

[chopperk]

Joe and Kam invited 20 million illegals and they took up most of the accommodations that were affordable.

[Ruy Dias de Bivar]

***Tolerated the mold growing in the bathroom***

A spray bottle with chlorine bleach in it will fix that up nicely.

[The Antiyuppie]

“…subject to the whims of the private market…”

Also known as the free market, the law of supply and demand…

Why, I wonder, is housing so expensive there?

[Buttons12]

If I had one which I never would, I’d renovate in 2 steps:
1. Remove the tenants;
2. Put someone else’s name on the deed.

Either step would be a huge improvement.

[scrabblehack]

That would merit a flunk on a Section 8 inspection. Hey LA Times, Section 8 is a subsidy too.

It’s hard to believe that CA or any subdivision thereof would have looser inspection rules than the Federal Government.