L.A. Rent Will Go Up $100 Over The Next Two Years, According To USC Forecast

Despite a significant increase in the construction of multifamily housing, USC researchers project that Southern California rents will continue to rise. A forecast released Tuesday predicts that average rent on a Southern California apartment will rise by at least $100 over the next two years, according to KPCC. The USC Casden Multifamily Forecast—an annual report completed by Beacon Economics and USC's Lusk Center for Real Estate—predicts that average rents in Los Angeles County will likely hit $1,416 a month in 2018, an 8.3% jump from last year, while in Orange County, average rents are likely to rise 9.4% to an average of $1,736, according to the L.A. Times.

These dire predictions come even as Southern California housing construction accelerates: the L.A. Times reports that permits for more than 38,000 multifamily units were pulled last year across Los Angeles, Orange, San Bernardino, Riverside and San Diego counties, the highest total since before the recession.

But population and employment growth "are driving up demand faster than new inventory can hit the market," as Raphael Bostic, interim director of the USC Lusk Center for Real Estate, told the Times.

"For renters," Bostic told the Times, "new construction has simply kept a bad situation from getting drastically worse."