NYC politics
fromtherealdeal.com
1 day agoDoomed to fail: Why Rent Guidelines Board always gets it wrong
The Rent Guidelines Board's process is ineffective and cannot set appropriate rent increases for diverse tenants.
Good urbanism should transcend politics. Socialists and capitalists can walk the same neighborhood and agree it's a pleasant place to live. They can each appreciate the tree canopy, the corner café with people spilling onto the sidewalk, the mix of ages on bikes and on foot, the architectural details of older buildings, and so on.
The cost rose a lot following the pandemic. And some of that was supply chain issues that really increased the costs, and then they didn't quite come back down. And now tariffs are also impacting some products. These costs are part of the reason the amount of new rental housing stock is shrinking.
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, rents have jumped nearly 28% in past five years. Companies such as Flex, Livble and, more recently, Affirm, say breaking rent into multiple payments can help renters manage cash flow. But consumer advocates warn the products typically function like short-term loans, layering fees onto already strained budgets and, in some cases, carrying triple-digit effective interest rates - raising questions about whether they ease financial pressure or deepen it.
My friends and I are early 30s professionals living in one of America's most expensive cities and making middle-class incomes. None of us can afford to buy or save for a home here. We all rent, but we're not broke. We save for kids and retirement and illness, but a home isn't in the cards. But recently, we think we might have found an unconventional loophole.
Investors own roughly one in six of California's single-family residences. That's what my trusty spreadsheet found after reviewing a BatchData report that estimates investor ownership of houses and townhomes nationwide. Investors in this study include everything from giant companies controlling thousands of houses to folks with a small collection of rentals to short-term rental operators to people with a second home.