A news that probably does not surprise anyone: rents are on the rise in California.
Data from Rent.coman “apartment search engine and online marketplace”, found that rent in a number of cities was increasing significantly year on year.
In Los Angeles, studio and two-bedroom rentals were up 4% year over year; the three chambers are up 3%.
Research shows that the average apartment rent in Los Angeles is between $2,262 and $5,095 in 2022, according to Rent.com.
But despite the increase medium rent prices, there are some weird quirks in the data. While rents are going up on average, one specific rental type is actually going down: one-bedroom apartments.
In Los Angelesthe rental price of a one-bedroom apartment has fallen by more than 15% compared to last year.
Now, on average, one-bedroom rentals in Los Angeles are up 3%, but that includes all different types of rentals, not exclusively apartments, as Rent.com explains.
“My immediate conclusion is that houses, townhouses and condos for rent in Los Angeles are more expensive than apartments, which drives up the overall average,” said Brian Carberryeditor of Apartment Guide and Rent.com.
So if you live alone or with a spouse and a one bedroom apartment is what you are looking for, you might be in luck.
And it doesn’t stop in Los Angeles. Some northern California cities are also seeing declines. One-bedroom apartment rentals in San Francisco are down about 1% from a year ago. San Mateo, Milpitas, Walnut Creek, Alameda and Vacaville are all seeing similar price drops.
In Southern California, Ventura, Camarillo, Irvine, Huntington Beach, and Woodland Hills have all seen one-bedroom apartment rental prices fall by 3-17%.
The largest declines occurred in Fresno (-28.35%), Long Beach (-24.36%) and Santa Clara (-19.97%).
Again, it’s important to note that these declines are for one-bedroom apartment rentals only. Other rental types appear to be unresponsive to the decline, and other major metro areas like Pasadena, Burbank, Sacramento, San Jose and Oakland have not seen similar declines. One-bedroom apartments in these cities have all increased.
Moral of the story: rent prices are everywhere, but you can get lucky in some cities, proving once again that the age-old adage is true, it’s all about “location, location, location. “.
For more information on the methodology Rent.com uses to determine rental prices for one-bedroom apartments in cities across the country, Click here.
