The solution is to increase the number of apartments. Simple supply and demand.
I owned my own home between 1978 and 1998. Then my wife dumped me and I found myself renting. This was in the Seattle area.
My new wife and I rented the entire time we lived in Seattle for the simple reason that we could rent a nice 4-5 bedroom home the entire time for around $1400 -$1600. Meanwhile, house prices were going through the roof.
And the reason rent was so low is that rental properties were being drained of tenants because everybody was buying. In fact there was an old joke about the guy that a guy’s credit score was so bad that he couldn’t rent, so he had to buy a place instead.
It was supply and demand. Nobody wanted to rent. We left for Kentucky in 2011. It changed in that short time. Both sale and rental prices are through the roof.
It’s so bad over there that my daughter and her husband, that lived a couple of blocks of Market in Ballard, moved out here last summer. They now rent a MUCH NICER home for 2/3 the price. And the one in Ballard had no parking, and even the street was iffy. They are now in an upscale neighborhood with room for six cars in the driveway as well as a two car garage.
I think that as telecommuting becomes a viable option for more and more people, we will see flyover country increase in population as the cities are drained, left with only the criminal element and “welfare” recipients.
Put up more civilian barracks where many are turned into ghetto crime zones? Look at LA. One mans floor is another mans ceiling? They're a scourge on America.
Simply put, rising rents are the first signal of an upswing in the real estate cycle. Next comes that part of a boom wherein new units are built, existing units are updated/upgraded, unused office buildings/warehouses/factories are converted residential lofts, single family homes are converted to multi family, etc., etc., etc.
Good times ahead for RE.