California Housing Rent Increase

The cost of home rentals has skyrocketed since the COVID-19 pandemic as rental homes were sold to capture the COVID California real estate price appreciation. This has caused a significant shortage in rental properties throughout the United States, and we have since seen large rent increases in almost every city nationwide.

Apartment List compiled a list of California counties with the highest rent increases since the pandemic using data from Apartment List. The analysis is calculated using fully-representative median rent data for recent movers taken from the Census Bureau’s American Community Survey. Then calculated forward to the current month using a growth rate determined from real-time leases on their website.

The 21 counties ranged from an increase of 37% to a decrease of 13% from pre-pandemic rent prices. This change within a few years shows how the pandemic reset the housing market for buyers and renters alike.

The overall percentage of change in California home rental prices varies from county to county. In some counties, rents may decrease due to an increase in vacancy rate or a decrease in demand. These would include cities like San Mateo and San Francisco County. Both have decreased rental prices compared to pre-pandemic levels. In other counties, rents may rise due to population growth or wage increases.

According to new data from leading California housing experts, the number of home sales in almost every county in the state decreased during the last week of March compared with the previous year. The only county that saw an increase was Inyo, a sparsely-populated county on the eastern slope of the Sierra Nevada where just 19 homes were sold last month.