“Rent check” offers a snapshot of the financial challenges tenants face in Southern California’s tight housing market — and how costs vary across the region.
Buzz: Big-city apartment rents rose for the 19th consecutive month in May.
Source: My trusty spreadsheet reviewed ApartmentList’s monthly rent estimates for the 21 largest cities tracked in the four-county region. ApartmentList’s estimates include asking rents from its own online listings plus pricing data from government sources.
The big picture
Big-city rent: $2,067 — up $14 in one month and $284 higher in a year. That’s a population-weighted average of rent indexes for the 21 Southern California cities.
One-month change: 0.7% gain vs. average 0.4% increases in the previous six months. Yes, getting worse!
12-month change: 15.9% jump vs. average 17.4% increase in the previous six months. That’s painful, but … there’s a tiny slowing in the year-over-year pace of increases.
5-year rent inflation: 4.2% annualized gains. As you can see, the current market is by no means normal.
The cityscape
Let’s look at the extremes of the market at the city level, starting with overall rents …
Highest: Irvine at $3,061 a month, Temecula at $2,803, and Huntington Beach at $2,640.
Lowest: Long Beach at $1,667, Los Angeles at $1,889, and Pomona at $1,942.
Next, how monthly increases varied …
Largest: Corona at 2.2%, Moreno Valley at 2%, and Temecula at 1.8%. This is more evidence of an inland migration.
Biggest dips: Yes, a few cities saw small slips — West Covina, down 0.8%, Costa Mesa, down 0.6% and Burbank, off 0.2%.
What did tenants see in the past 12 months …
Largest hikes: Santa Ana at 22.1%, Irvine at 21.2%, and Fullerton at 19.3%. Orange County’s high wages and low unemployment often balloons rents.
Smallest: Rancho Cucamonga at 10.6%, Long Beach at 12.6%, and Santa Clarita at 13.7%. In most eras, those are huge increases.
And with a longer-term lens, look at annualized rent inflation during the past five years …
Largest: Moreno Valley at 8%, Rancho Cucamonga at 6.2%, and Pomona at 6.2%. Again, apartment dwellers are flocking inland.
Smallest: Los Angeles at 1.4%, Burbank at 2.3%, and Glendale at 2.4%. Let’s politely say that L.A. County has an image problem with renters.
The bottom line
The sliver of good news? Rents fell in six of the 21 cities from April to May, the most one-month dips in five months.
The caveat
Rent data varies widely depending on who is counting what, where and when.
Is a study looking at what landlords want for empty apartment units, condos or single-family homes? Or what tenants say they are paying for any unit? Or what management companies are collecting each month?
One example: The Consumer Price Index for Los Angeles and Orange counties shows the cost of renting in 2022’s first four months is up 3.43% in a year. In 2021, rent inflation ran at 1.24%.
The CPI is drawn from a survey of consumers in a wide range of rental arrangements. And while the rent inflation rate may seem low, but the one-year jump is the biggest since 1980.
Jonathan Lansner is the business columnist for the Southern California News Group. He can be reached at jlansner@scng.com
Source: Orange County Register
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