Essentially. They can’t freely change rent for current tenants since they need to stay within the confines of whatever lease was agreed upon, but they can make rent whatever they want for new tenants, so it’s not an uncommon occurrence for them to simply stop fixing things in a timely manner so that current tenants feel compelled to leave, and then they can fill the space, charging whatever they feel someone will pay for rent after that. It’s scummy, and it’s technically illegal, but everyone knows they won’t really get in trouble for it.
Same thing happens where I live, but there is recourse. If it were me, I’d probably try to fix things on my own if I were getting a great deal on rent. Not that I’d have to, but to save myself from having to move. Of course, that’s not an option for everyone.
Still, with a lot of the rental market (again, where I live) being newcomers, I don’t think it’d make sense to immediately jack up the rates… they’d be turning away too much of the market.
Well, once the lease is over people have to sign a new one anyway, so even existing tenants can only lock in rates for so long. And when one landlord ups rent, it’s usually because all the other landlords are doing it too - it seems like they do it in unison, I imagine because they don’t want to have to worry about people leaving for somewhere cheaper. I’m not sure if it’s illegal like price fixing or not, but it doesn’t seem to make a difference in the end.
Can landlords just change rent whenever they feel like it in the US?
Essentially. They can’t freely change rent for current tenants since they need to stay within the confines of whatever lease was agreed upon, but they can make rent whatever they want for new tenants, so it’s not an uncommon occurrence for them to simply stop fixing things in a timely manner so that current tenants feel compelled to leave, and then they can fill the space, charging whatever they feel someone will pay for rent after that. It’s scummy, and it’s technically illegal, but everyone knows they won’t really get in trouble for it.
Same thing happens where I live, but there is recourse. If it were me, I’d probably try to fix things on my own if I were getting a great deal on rent. Not that I’d have to, but to save myself from having to move. Of course, that’s not an option for everyone.
Still, with a lot of the rental market (again, where I live) being newcomers, I don’t think it’d make sense to immediately jack up the rates… they’d be turning away too much of the market.
Well, once the lease is over people have to sign a new one anyway, so even existing tenants can only lock in rates for so long. And when one landlord ups rent, it’s usually because all the other landlords are doing it too - it seems like they do it in unison, I imagine because they don’t want to have to worry about people leaving for somewhere cheaper. I’m not sure if it’s illegal like price fixing or not, but it doesn’t seem to make a difference in the end.