In a season of gift-giving, many Los Angeles residents are unwrapping a less pleasant surprise — rent increases of up to 6%.
City officials have been considering major changes to the rent control limits that apply to three-quarters of L.A. apartments. In recent months, outside economists and the city’s own housing officials have determined that some aspects of the city’s decades-old rent control formula should be changed to more fairly balance the needs of tenants and landlords.
However, because the L.A. City Council has failed to vote on the issue ahead of a looming February deadline, many tenants are about to receive substantially higher increases based on the old formula.
Cindy Sanders, a senior citizen living in a rent-controlled apartment in Studio City, recently found a notice taped to her door saying that her rent would be going up 5% on Feb. 1.
“I was just like, oh my God, Merry Christmas — here's one more thing we have to look forward to,” Sanders said.
As a retiree, Sanders noted that her Social Security benefits will be going up 2.5% next year, causing her rent to grow faster than her income for the second year in a row.
“For a long-term tenant on a fixed income, you're never going to get ahead,” Sanders said.
Tenant advocates call for pause on rent hikes
Tenant advocacy groups are now calling on the City Council to put a temporary pause on rent increases until the council has passed an updated rent control formula. So far, the council has not indicated that it has any plans to act on the upcoming rent increases.
“Tenants should not be penalized for the city's delay in acting,” said Faizah Malik, an attorney with the nonprofit public interest law firm Public Counsel and a member of the Keep L.A. Housed coalition.
“It's too bad the council did not act” before going on winter recess, Malik added. “We really hope that when they come back, they treat this with some urgency.”
Why Feb. 1 is such a key date
The reason so many L.A. tenants are facing an increase on Feb. 1 goes back to the waning days of the city’s COVID-19 emergency period.
For nearly four years during the pandemic, the city banned all rent increases in rent-controlled housing. That rent freeze lasted much longer than in many other cities, leading to an outcry from landlords who said their expenses during that time were rising sharply.
The City Council voted to end the COVID-19 rent freeze on Feb. 1, 2024. On that day, the vast majority of tenants in L.A. became eligible for rent increases of up to 4%, plus an additional 2% if their landlord paid for both gas and electricity in their units.
Because landlords are allowed to increase rents once per year, the next annual rent hike for many L.A. tenants is coming on Feb. 1, 2025. Landlords must give at least 30-day’s notice before an increase takes effect.
Many tenants are starting to receive those notices now.
No word from City Council on vote timing
Most L.A. residents are renters. About half of them are paying more than 30% of their income on rent, a level considered unaffordable by federal government standards.
Through a public records request, LAist recently published a city-commissioned report from the Economic Roundtable, an independent nonprofit research group. That report found that some provisions in the city’s rent control ordinance have favored landlords over tenants.
The report found that among the one-fifth of L.A. renters living below the federal poverty line, about half are spending 90% of their income or more on rent, leaving them perilously close to eviction and homelessness.
LAist reached out to the office of the council’s housing committee chair, Nithya Raman, and asked why the lower rent increases had not yet been scheduled for a vote. We also asked if she was in favor of putting a temporary hold on rent increases.
We did not receive a response. A spokesperson said Raman was out of town.
Current rules and proposed changes
L.A.’s rent control limits generally apply to tenants living in apartments built before October 1978. Annual rent caps are determined by regional inflation data.
Under the current limits, landlords will be allowed to raise rents by 4% on Feb. 1 — plus an additional 1% for each utility (gas and electricity) they cover in a tenant’s unit.
Other areas with rent control in Southern California typically have lower caps on rent hikes. For example, the L.A. County Board of Supervisors recently voted to cap rent increases below 3% next year for rent-controlled tenants in unincorporated parts of the county.
The authors of the Economic Roundtable report recommended using a different measure of inflation to calculate allowable increases. The city’s Housing Department calculated that increases next year would be capped at 2% based on the report’s recommended formula.
The Economic Roundtable report also noted that other cities in California with rent control do not allow landlords to add an extra 2% increase each year if they pay for utilities.
L.A.’s Housing Department issued a report last month recommending the City Council vote to get rid of the utilities bump. The report concluded, “In the case of long-term tenancies, the additional rent increase exceeds the total cost of the utility service.”
Tenants brace for another 6% rent hike
Despite recommendations from city housing officials to end the utilities bump, many tenants are scheduled to receive the extra 2% increase on Feb. 1.
One of them is Maribel Velasquez Herrera, a fast food worker whose landlord raised the rent in her Pico-Union apartment by 6% early this year. She recently received notice of another 6% increase this upcoming February.
“I know that rent is going up too much,” Velasquez Herrera said, speaking in Spanish. “What landlords are doing now is getting people out and then renting for $1,400 to $1,600. To not live on the street, you have to pay.”
Once Velasquez Herrera’s 6% rent increase takes effect in February, her monthly rent will have risen by about $135 in the last two years. She said lower rent increases would allow her to more easily afford food, clothing and have enough left over to go to the dentist or optometrist.
Landlords want city to allow higher increases
Meanwhile, landlords have urged the city to permit higher increases in rent-controlled apartments, saying they’re struggling to keep up with the ballooning costs of building maintenance and insurance. They unsuccessfully lobbied the City Council to allow increases of up to 9% after L.A.’s COVID-19 rent freeze ended.
With city officials now recommending stricter caps, landlords are again arguing L.A. rent control has failed to account for the rising expenses that come with owning rental housing.
“The cost of labor and materials have skyrocketed,” wrote Marc Chopp in a comment to the council. “In addition, legal costs to evict non-paying and nuisance tenants has become extremely expensive due to all the legal motions and jury trials that have become standard in these legal proceedings.”
But for tenants like Michael Powelson, rent increases are arriving at the same time incomes are falling. Powelson works as a history lecturer in the California State University system. He said his pay is set to drop because he’s scheduled to teach fewer classes next semester.
“Even with rent control, I can barely pay my bills,” said Powelson, who recently got notice that the rent for his Van Nuys apartment would be going up 4% in February. “If you have housing shooting through the roof and salaries going down, I mean, it's not rocket science.”
