LA fire victims are suddenly thrust into an unforgiving rental housing market

While thousands of families search for stability after losing their homes in the past week’s historic Los Angeles fires, many are suddenly confronting another crisis: the region’s long-standing shortage of affordable rental housing.

Now, that shortage has become much worse.

“Every time I call somebody about a listing, I break into tears,” said Tina Poppy.

Her Altadena house, purchased in 2019, was destroyed in the Eaton Fire. Poppy said her family had just finished extensively renovating it into their dream home.

Poppy said she, her husband, two kids and three dogs are temporarily staying at a home offered by a member of a local moms group on Facebook. But the family’s search for longer-term housing is turning up listings with fewer bedrooms, worse amenities and asking rents far in excess of her family’s previous mortgage payment.

“There's not much available for rent, and what is available is just disappearing immediately, and there's a lot of price gouging,” Poppy said. “It's so hard to believe that I'm fighting tooth and nail to get this house that I don't want.”

‘Astronomical' rent increases

Displaced families have been contacting LAist with multiple examples of rental listings that show huge jumps in asking rents in the wake of the fires.

LAist reported on one listing for a four-bedroom home in Bel Air that went up Saturday morning for $29,500 per month — a nearly 86% increase from the property’s advertised rent in September 2024. The listing agent told LAist she advised her client to put the home up for rent after the fires broke out.

“People are desperate, and you can probably get good money,” said the agent, Fiora Aston, with Compass. The listing was taken down later that same day.

“We're seeing astronomical rent increases,” said Chelsea Kirk, a policy and advocacy director with L.A.-based tenant rights nonprofit Strategic Actions for a Just Economy.

Over the past week, Kirk and her colleagues have been collecting data from public listings on post-fire rent increases. So far, she said they’ve collected more than 400 listings that appear to have increased rents above the 10% limit currently in place since Gov. Gavin Newsom issued an emergency declaration banning post-disaster price gouging, which included rental housing.

Kirk said she’s seeing increases hovering around 30% on average, but as much as 75% in some listings. When agents or landlords were called about these rent hikes, she said, some claimed they were unaware of the prohibition on price gouging. In some cases, she said, listings were taken down or the rents were lowered in response.

“Maybe it was a mistake and they didn't know it was illegal,” Kirk said. “But that doesn't mean it's not shameful that they wanted to price gouge during a crisis. Whether it's legal or not, it's definitely morally wrong.”

Rents are rising, and not just on mansions

Like the Bel Air listing spotted by LAist, many of the advertised homes are targeting the high end of L.A.’s housing market. The Palisades Fire destroyed thousands of homes in parts of coastal L.A. that tend to cater to wealthier households, like Malibu and the Pacific Palisades.

But dramatic price increases are also being found in more modest apartments. Kirk flagged one listing in L.A.’s Westlake neighborhood that was first listed for around $2,400 per month in October 2024, but increased to nearly $3,300 on Jan. 9.

Housing policy experts say L.A.’s rental market — which already had a severe shortage of affordable housing, particularly among units large enough for families with children — will likely be supercharged by the sudden influx of thousands immediately needing new housing.

Michael Lens, an urban planning and public policy professor at UCLA, said homeowners who’ve paid off their mortgages and long-term renters who were paying below market rates could particularly struggle to get back on their feet.

“Folks who haven't had to really think about where they're going to live next — who may have been living in, fortunately, stable housing situations for the last couple decades — are going to see a lot of sticker shock,” Lens said.

What happened after Hawaii’s fires

Even after the immediate scramble for new housing subsides, costs in Southern California could remain elevated for an extended period, housing economists say. A recent survey of Hawaiians impacted by the 2023 Maui fires found that one year after the disaster there, families were paying 43% more on average to rent housing of a similar size or smaller.

Trey Gordner, a data scientist with the University of Hawaii Economic Research Organization, said Angelenos affected by the fires should anticipate a long road to recovery.

“It's going to be a bigger challenge for a longer time than I think many people are prepared for,” said Gordner, a co-author of the Hawaii study.

Landlord groups warn members not to price gouge

Dan Yukelson, CEO of local landlord advocacy group the Apartment Association of Greater Los Angeles, said the organization is compiling a database of available units, some with waived security deposits, for wildfire victims. He said the organization has also notified its members about the anti-price gouging limits in effect.

“If I saw somebody that had pricing before the emergency, and then you see it going up by more than 10%, they should be reported and prosecuted by the attorney general,” Yukelson said.

Under Newsom’s emergency order, it is also illegal to evict a tenant in order to rent at a higher price to someone displaced by the fires. But Javier Beltran, deputy director for the L.A.-based Housing Rights Center, said he worries some landlords will try anyway.

“Bad player landlords could not accept rent, or could start harassing, or even give just notices of termination without any legal basis, just to scare up tenants in order to move out,” Beltran said. “If [tenants] get any kind of notice within the next couple months, I would say they should seek some legal assistance.”

Beltran recommended tenants reach out to StayHousedLA.org, a coalition of legal aid providers funded by the city and county of L.A., for help if needed.

Displaced residents face unanswered questions

Meanwhile, many of the people now looking for a place to stay are renters who saw their apartments incinerated. Some are wondering if they’ll receive help covering the costs of finding another rental.

Tupe Asiata told LAist the Altadena townhome where she lived with her three sons may have survived the fires, but homes and businesses on the same block were destroyed. She’s not sure when it might be safe to return. She said she paid rent on Jan. 1, and her savings won’t cover the high monthly rent plus security deposit that landlords expect before tenants move in.

“We're having to depend on unknown resources,” Asiata said. “We've filled out the FEMA [application] online. Our stuff is pending. I've never been through anything like this, so I don't know what the time frame is of when help is going to arrive.”

Asiata said she was staying in an Airbnb rental with a relative’s family, who also lost their Altadena home in the fire. But she said that was only a short-term solution.

“My heart is broken,” Asiata said. “I'm very scared, because this isn't just myself. I have kids that are looking at me like, ‘Where are we going?’

“For the first time, I'm feeling like I don't know.”