Dedicated to Empowering and Informing the Burlingame Community

Renters Are Screwed

There have been a number of crazy rent control proposals floating around California and now five of them have actually been passed into law.  Rather than me describe the Unintended Consequences, let's let a Berkeley professor (in the actual subject matter being discussed) lay it out.  The Comicle buried the lead at the bitter end of today's article

Kenneth Rosen, chair of the Fisher Center for Real Estate and Urban Economics at UC Berkeley’s Haas School of Business and a real estate consultant, said California was making a mistake by adopting a cap on rent increases.

Research on local rent-control ordinances has found they reduce the supply of rental housing, Rosen said, by encouraging landlords to convert apartment units to condominiums or other uses and diminishing the incentive for developers to build new housing.  The rent cap will become a floor for many landlords, he added, who will raise prices by the maximum amount allowed each year — which is far higher than annual rent increases recently.

“From a housing policy point of view, nothing could be worse,” Rosen said. “It’s going to make housing less affordable.”

There you have it.  I'm guessing empty units are being pulled off the market as we speak in buildings more than 15 years old.  Next up?  A ballot measure to break down Prop 13 by going to "split rolls" separating commerical property from residential treatment and raising rates.  If this passes you can plan on much more pain for brick and mortar retailers and restaurants on B'way and the Avenue as the rents jump.

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48 responses to “Renters Are Screwed”

  1. resident

    AirBnB and VRBO are having keggers today in the office.

  2. You suck

    As if you expect us to believe that you care anything about renters.

  3. Paloma Ave

    But Joe, don’t you realize that democrats, liberals, progressives, socialists and communists are just looking out for our best interests? (I have heard that sarcasm doesn’t always translate in the written word).

  4. Joe

    I’m just reading the tea leaves coming out of Berkeley and Sacramento. Whether I care or not is irrelevant. The question Mr. Sucker needs to ask is do his “advocates” care? If they do they are just misguided. If not, then they are just self-aggrandizing in hopes of future payoff. You’re screwed either way ;-(

  5. Barking Dog

    The split roll will put a lot of vacancy signs in windows. Probably for sale signs too from generational owners of the commercial property as they will take their money and invest in more tax friendly states, where they can get more square footage with the same return.
    Split roll and the City of SSF Mobility 20/20 plan, will kill light industrial east of 101 in my opinion. Which maybe exactly what the city wants to accommodate Genentech(who plans to build more and add 11k employees) and the other big biotech firms in the area. Tenants with long term AIR commercial leases are going to get hammered hard with CAM increases from the landlords. SSF is getting farther and farther away from its Industrial City slogan.
    https://www.ssf.net/government/mobility-20-20

  6. Bruce Dickinson

    Folks, you don’t need a professor at Berkeley to state such obvious concepts that one would have hoped all have learned in a basic college economics 101 class (or even in high school).
    What is not so obvious is that rent control actually drives UP real estate prices, thereby increasing the gap between the have’s and have not’s. Let me quote one of my all time favorite BV contributors: Bruce Dickinson! That’s right, I couldn’t have said it better myself than what I stated here a few years ago.
    https://www.burlingamevoice.com/2016/09/rent-control-part-8-outnumbered-101#comments
    “If Bruce Dickinson were really concerned about economic self-interest I would vote for rent control, as that makes newer rentals more expensive, crowds out single family rentals, thus more people buy houses, resulting in rising owned housing values, and higher incentives to tear down apartment buildings and build new condos/houses. In a few decades, what will be left is a small fraction of long-time renters that get cheap rent at the expense of everyone else. Doesn’t sound fair to me and is anti-populist, but what do I know, I’m just a caveman legendary record producer?!!”
    So if Joe is really the greedy, self-interested person that You Suck thinks he is, Joe should be PRO rent control!!!!
    Serious question, in California, is an economics class a mandatory part of a HS education???

  7. Fugit All

    As a lifetime resident of SM and Burlingame and a renter I look forward to knowing the maximum amount my housing costs will increase next year… and the nest…. and the next… just like so many of you who continue to benefit from Prop 13
    I love this town and hope every year I will not be priced out. A maximum increase of my rental costs per annum will allow me to calculate just how long I can continue to live, work, and contribute here.
    I’m all the time discouraged at the vitriol toward renters on this forum. You assume I’m here to leech off the teat of City Hall and Sacramento. Meanwhile, I can tell you what B-ave looked like in the 80s, 90s, and 00s. I remember Coyote Pt, SFO, downtown SM and SF from the last four decades. I’ve eaten, shopped, studied, and worked in your town for dozens of years. I stay because I love it here, maybe even more than you do. I simply do not have the capital to invest in property that you do. That does not make me a bad Burlingame resident.
    Many of you are property owners and landlords. Perhaps you benefit from Prop 13; you might even be in a position where you would be unable to afford your property were it not for that beneficial piece of legislation. Consider for a moment that you are fortunate to have a surer footing in living here and not that you love this town more than some renter because you sign a check to a mortgage company and not a rental agency.
    We are all neighbors.

  8. Barking Dog

    So once Prop 13 gets voted out and the rent control issues are in place as some hope, you the renter of many years in Burlingame will have a easier time paying for housing than a property owner in Burlingame who might get pushed out with Prop 13 gone? As Joe states above, Prop 13 in next on the advocates/Dems agenda. Fugit, as a long time renter, you seem to fall in the category that Bruce poetically describes above. Who’s the one benefiting now?

  9. Barking Dog

    Prop 58 is high on state Dems radar too.

  10. Barking Dog

    Joe, nail on head with rental listings being pulled from market.
    A family friend, who’s family business/ownership has about 120 doors in San Mateo, Burlingame and Millbrae, Just pulled 14 available units off the market. He also told me that every lease is month to month, nothing long term anymore. More economical sense for him to let them sit empty, then putting renter in them at this point in time.
    Again, nail on head…Law of Unintended Consequences…nice work

  11. Barking Dog

    Resident…nail on head as well.
    AirBnB and AirBnB for Work
    VBRO
    Sonder
    Zeus
    Nestpick
    https://youtu.be/AG9eUnWJC2k

  12. Barking

    Sorry wrong link
    https://youtu.be/FkbzlBuOG9Q

  13. Bruce Dickinson

    Now, Prop 13 is a completely different issue, one that also interferes with the turnover and market clearing price of real estate. Prop 13 is a subsidy given to long-time owners of houses, and the subsidy increases the more real estate values go up.
    If your property goes up in value by 8% a year, but your property taxes only go up by a capped rate of 2%, those buying houses in future years are paying far higher taxes than those grandfathered in when they bought real estate at lower valuations. Again, the effect is older housing not getting rebuilt or turning over as quickly (because moving would result in much higher taxes on the new house), thereby limiting ove all supply of houses….this pushes house prices up! Now if everyone paid the exact same property tax rate on the fair market value of a house, owning houses for a large part of the population would become extremely expensive/untenable, which would probably increase people moving to other locations or going to cheaper rental housing, thereby driving real estate prices down.
    So here’s the Bruce Dickinson zinger: those who are anti-rent control should ALSO be anti-prop 13, as rent control or prop 13 provide massive subsidies to those who have lived in their (rental or owned) property for a long time, at the expense of new/young residents and these policies distort the true market clearing price of real estate. New families or people moving to California are at a huge disadvantage versus those who were lucky and were at the right place at the right time.
    Just making a point on philosophical consistency as the existing tax regime of Prop 13 is resulting in huge imbalances of tax burden and real estate inflation, much like rent control also results in huge imbalances in rental supply and differential rental rates.
    You can’t say that Bruce Dickinson doesn’t get your noggin’s neurons firing, ya know what I mean?!?

  14. Joe

    @Fugit – “I’m all the time discouraged at the vitriol toward renters on this forum. You assume I’m here to leech off the teat of City Hall and Sacramento.”. Wrong! If there is any vitriol towards renters here it is ONLY, SOLELY, those that think someone else should pay a big chunk of their rent.
    @BruceD – nice landing, wrong airport. The residential side of Prop 13 is not at issue next year–it’s just the commercial side. Now the argument for a “split roll” is investors move out of investment teams without the property turning over this preserving (falsely) the lower basis. But as Barking Dog noted, multi-generational retail space that is forced to turnover with a split roll will drive up retail merchant rents right when that is not tenable. I know that some B’way merchants have been discussing this with trepidation.

  15. Bruce Dickinson

    Yes, Joe, I was referring to the residential side of Prop 13 in response to BD’s and FugittaboutIt’s comments about certain classes of long time homeowners benefiting from perpetually lower property taxes.
    A little quick to jump to the gun, Joe? Bruce Dickinson takes it you might be one of those lucky beneficiaries of Prop 13 and seem very keen to defend your personal subsidy under Prop 13! *wink*
    I don’t blame you, I would gladly be ok with free money just as much as the next guy!

  16. Joe

    So enlighten me on your wise thoughts about the split roll.
    There really are no “lucky beneficiaries” in California when you consider the overall tax take…I mean rate. Unless you are here “Under cover of the night” (a Stones song that should be better regarded IMHO) and are using someone else’s SSN – which apparently some judge finds to NOT be illegal — then the overall take is among the highest in the nation and likely to get worse.

  17. Fugit All

    Joe, care to calculate the difference on property taxes for the last 30 year with and without Prop 13 and what that difference might have earned if invested conservatively? Would you still make the argument “there are no ‘lucky beneficiaries’ in California’?
    You and I have been paying the same sales tax and have been subject to the same income tax agendas but we’re not on the same planet when it comes to paying for the privilege of paying for housing here. And yet I can practically hear you rubbing your hands together when you gleefully post about how us renters “are screwed” under Newsom’s new legislation.
    Is that because you see the writing on the wall about Prop 13 despite how much that has benefitted you for so many years? I’m just curious how you are so eager to benefit from and even defend the wildly unequal tax benefits to long-time property owners of this locale but would be so quick to denegrate a similar scheme when offered to residents here?
    It all feels like a class issues writ small and it’s gross.

  18. Barking Dog

    Prop 13 was voted on with about 75% approval.
    Prop 13 intentions are from the start were to protect home owners and keeping them in their family home. If I wasnt under prop 13, my property tax yearly would probably be more than what I paid for my house in 1970, based on its market value today. In another post, Joe stated that in Washington, some long time home owners are getting pushed out due to them being reassessed. They cant afford the property taxes on a house they have been in for decades. I forget the points on why this is, but Prop 13 prevented this from happening to lots of homeowners in California.
    Prop 13 is now being abused by the heirs of properties. They aren’t going back to live in the family home, as Prop 13 was intended to accomplish. The heirs are renting their family homes out and reaping the rewards of the market in California or just using their family homes as 2nd homes.
    Yes, I agree there are flaws to Prop 13, but it kept many of homeowners in their homes, who might have been pushed out if they were reassessed annually. It has done it job and protect home owners. I think Prop 58 is hurting the renters, not Prop 13. I’d do think that once the parent/grandparents pass, and the children/grandchildren who are the beneficiary of the property take ownership, the property should be reassessed.
    Prop 58 is hurting renters, not Prop 13 IMO.

  19. Barking Dog

    Fugit, like it or not, Joe and Bruce are 100% correct, any form of rent control, will drive rental rates up. Eliminating Prop 13, will drive rents up(commercial or residential).
    Be careful what you and the other rent control advocates wish for, as you might price yourself out of Burlingame. As Joe states often….Law of Unintended Consequences..

  20. Just Visiting

    If helping keep people in their own homes is the reason for Prop 13, then the “split roll” change to it–not protecting commercial properties–shouldn’t be an issue. It’s been a few years since I last looked at the statistics, but individual homes turn over much faster than commercial property. Commercial property rarely sells, which means that commercial property owners are paying ridiculously low property taxes. That’s where the majority of the problem with Prop 13 comes. Moreover, the connection between the property taxes and the rent charged is questionable, as rent is a function of what the market will bear. As a result, many landowners have reaped significant increases in rental income without paying increases in property taxes. That’s a windfall to the land owner–and it has nothing to do with keeping Joe in his home.
    Unfortunately, the professor emeritus at Haas knows a great deal about what he speaks: rent control generally drives up the cost of rentals. For people who want to stay in their rental unit, yes, it helps. But for people who want to move–and the reality is that many people do as life circumstances change–it is a disaster. And for anyone new to the area, it’s even worse.
    The problem is one of supply: we need more housing stock (the whole Bay Area does). And we need to protect what makes our city special. Balancing those two things is hard, but rent control legislating, including what was just passed in Sacremento, is likely to make the supply problem worse, not better. And like many beneficiaries of Prop 13, those who these laws help (whether they need it or not) will be happy to take the benefits while the system burns around them–and until they want to move and realize they can’t.

  21. Barking Dog

    I happen to agree with you on the split roll JustV, for the most part.. In full disclosure, my wife is the beneficiary of one such property in San Francisco at this time. But, this is the 1st tenant that has occupied the building, as my father in law ran his business out of the building for 65+yrs. He was an owner/operator. Bought the land, built the building, built the business.

  22. Barking Dog

    If the split gets voted in, counties have self admitted they wont be able to handle and process all the properties….and hiring new assessors isnt easy when corporate giants, Apple, etc are hiring and paying more for assessors to fight counties on their property tax bills.
    https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.sfchronicle.com/politics/amp/Prop-13-reform-headed-to-California-ballot-could-14074032.php

  23. hollyroller@gmail.com

    Homeowner’s, and their Lobbyist’s Basic Political Foundation is based on the perception that Renter’s over the age of 40 are loser’s. People who have profited from P13 are in their 70’s.
    Their “Family” retains the P13 benefit, therefore, not paying the fair taxes needed in CA.
    There was a need for P13 Forty plus years ago.
    Instead we pay $4.50.00 per gallon.

  24. Bruce Dickinson

    Joe, as to Bruce Dickinson’s wise thoughts on the split roll? Not that I’m preparing a tax plan for the State of California…, let’s call it Dickonomics, as it were (*wink*), I think the whole property, sales, gas, and income tax needs a complete overhaul at every level of (state and local) government. I know, it’s an impossible task, but these would be my guiding principles:
    Restrike Prop 13 (Commercial and Residential) and introduce very gradually a more aggressive property tax increase, but not so much so that it becomes completely untenable for those on fixed incomes. Let’s say instead of 2%, make it 3% cap per year phased over 10 years (where it increases by .01% each year from 2% to 3%), a tax credit for retirees on their property tax bill based on income, a large reduction in income tax for the middle and lower classes, reductions in gasoline tax and sales tax (these two can be very regressive). I would also enable some recapture of re-assessed values when property changes hands due to death of parents–there’s no reason why being born in the right womb should give you more of a tax shelter more than anyone else.
    Would have to pencil out the numbers, but any increase in projected property taxes should be offset by tax reductions in the other areas I mentioned with more aggressive cuts on the sales and gasoline taxes vs the income taxes and keep corporate taxes the same for large companies, but lower them for small businesses. The whole goal would be to capture more money from those who can afford the higher property and income taxes in a progressive fashion.
    The problem with just addressing the split roll next year is that California is already VERY business unfriendly, as can be seen by many companies of decent size leaving the State in droves. The only exception is technology, but they already pay some of the lowest taxes due to their operations being overseas (taxed at lower foreign rates) and the tax deductibility of options grants to their employees. Lowering taxes for businesses would really help California’s economy to become more diversified rather than focused on a few large industries. So I don’t think the split roll is the right thing to do for business and should definitely not be done if companies’ State corporate tax bills aren’t reduced.
    Some pretty good ideas, eh? Wow, come to think of it, maybe I’m Burlingame’s version of a “very stable genius”!?!

  25. Paloma Ave

    If greedy politicians didn’t have an insatiable appetite for more of are money, ALL THE TIME, there would have been no need for Prop 13.
    I find it funny that our local politicians make the headlines when they support a proposed tax hike. When have they ever not supported a tax hike?

  26. hollyroller@gmail.com

    Until a Huge West Coast Earthquake happens-we all know it will, investing in Bay Area Business’ is a No Go.
    Facebook coming here is good for Facebook. That’s all.
    I am hoping some Major Employment Oversight representing The State of California will be in effect to review the People being hired.
    I am ALL IN for DICK-O-NOMICS too.
    MOREDICKS MOREDICKS MOREDICKS!
    Where do we VOTE for MOREDICKS.

  27. Fugit All

    Getting back to the original topic of “Renters (getting) screwed,” I can remember a year in which my rent increased more than 20% because I asked for a light switch change in the same month my smoke detectors were switched out. Actually, the request was made by an apartment sitter of mine and not myself because I know better than to request more than a single change in the fall months of the year when my annual rent increase letter is due to be slid under my door.
    Some years it’s as low as 2%. One year it was especially painful and was $250/year; or around 20%. The point is, I never know how much it will be. I’m currently living with a broken stove and a leaking hot water faucet in the bathroom. I dare not ask for either to be repaired because I’ve already had the busted window blind repaired this summer and too much at once results in astronomical housing expense increases.
    So, I shut off the hot water in the bathroom at the valve beneath the sink. And I use an air fryer instead of the oven even though I love to cook and prepare my own meals as a way to save money. I’m completely ignoring the death knells my fridge is making. Last fall the building’s washer/dryer was replaced and now it costs 25% more in quarters to do laundry even though it’s twice as hard to get quarters for the task (my credit union has contracted).
    It’s a pretty mundane list of grievances, yeah? Compound that list every year you’ve lived in your residence. Imagine being afraid to ask that both your sink AND your stove get fixed because both at once is surely too much, too greedy. Now imagine that stress every year when new things arise that need fixing. Sometime you ask for them to be addressed and you are punished. Sometimes you pretend they can be ignored and still you are punished.
    Rent control means a person can ask to have their stove, sink, and heat fixed in the same season and not be forced out of their home from punitive rent increases.

  28. hollyroller@gmail.com

    When I lived in SF in the 1980’s rent control was a great thing, especially considering the age of the “market.”
    Part of the rent control covers internal repairs.
    -If the Owner/Corporation does not make repairs in a reasonable time(3 weeks)the tenant can pay a contractor-or themselves to do the work and deduct the cost from the Rent Bill. I understand the need to raise rents. SF has a cap. So no one is surprised, or kicked out.
    Rent Control is just good business. Moral too.

  29. Barking Dog

    https://youtu.be/EuSxcYkBdCQ
    Here’s what rent control and “affordable” housing developers did for these renters.

  30. Barking Dog

    Nail on head
    https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.bizjournals.com/sanfrancisco/news/2019/09/12/guest-opinion-state-rent-control-will-hit-small.amp

  31. Joe

    ….and this didn’t take long:
    Assembly Bill 1482 was signed by Gov. Gavin Newsom last week and starting Jan. 1, it will prevent landlords from raising rents by more than 5% a year plus the regional consumer price index. The bill had a retroactive clause that caused all rents to freeze to the level they were on March 15, 2019, so any increase now would have to go back to that level come Jan. 1 when the law takes effect. So, for the next two-plus months, landlords can raise rent by any amount in Redwood City and tenants could be displaced if they cannot afford the increase — what’s often referred to as an economic eviction.
    On Monday, Assemblyman David Chiu, D-San Francisco, who authored AB 1482, urged the Redwood City Council to pass an urgency ordinance to protect renters from economic evictions before his bill takes effect.
    https://www.smdailyjournal.com/news/local/lawmaker-redwood-city-residents-seek-rent-ordinance/article_ca470604-f15c-11e9-870c-4351efd3f226

  32. Barking Dog

    You are in the loop Joe, you think that RWC council has the votes and will pass the urgency notice quickly, as LA seems to be doing today?
    Wonder how many more available came off the market today…??

  33. hollyroller@gmail.com

    Zero will come off the Market you Greedy Landload, yeah that’s right, Landload.

  34. Paloma Ave

    Holyroller – Can I send you a new set of “D” cells? If yes, what address?

  35. hollyroller@gmail.com

    What does that mean?

  36. Joe

    Well, here we go:
    The Burlingame City Council voted 4-1, with Councilwoman Ann Keighran opposing, to enter a joint powers authority interested in purchasing a local apartment building with between 100 and 150 units.
    Should the authority operated by the California Community Housing Agency, or CalCHA, acquire the unspecified building, which is slated to go to market early next week, rents of the units would be reserved for those making between 60% to 120% of the area median income.
    https://www.smdailyjournal.com/news/local/burlingame-apartments-deal-gets-ok/article_e76fb276-1a2e-11ea-8fa0-2b14e44ea8e9#utm_source=smdailyjournal.com&utm_campaign=%2Fnewsletters%2Fheadlines%2F%3F-dc%3D1575903606&utm_medium=email&utm_content=headline
    ——
    For the mathematically challenged, 120% of area median income is above the area median income………………

  37. Barking Dog

    What is the initial investment of the City? Will this count towards the COB goal in the general plan for additional housing/affordable housing?
    No collection of property taxes on the land, nor does the county or local school district. Average about 1.5M a door in Burlingame(100-150 doors being discussed)and both BSD and SMUHSD floating bond measures in 2020….but this Joint Authority/Developer/Business Entity wouldn’t have to participate. Wow
    In my mind a(any) Joint Powers Authority = License to stick it to Joe Taxpayer.
    ZERO seats on a board of a Joint Authority and the COB will have skin in the game?? Wow and Wow.
    Thank you Ms Keighran for using common sense with your vote…not being rushed to vote YES on something you know(and what the Burlingame City Manager and the SM County Manager both expressed reservations with the financial impact)isn’t in the best interest of the taxpaying residents of Burlingame.
    Mr Brownrigg just lost a lot of votes in Burlingame for his State Senate run, IMO. He is going to have no problem, if elected, throwing Burlingame residents to the wolves and shoving a new version of SB50 down our throats next year.

  38. Barking Dog

    So after 15 or 30 years the COB has the opportunity to take over the property(I assume by buying out CalCHA holdings in the JPA, in property) and then the COB will become landlords? The COB can’t even schedule clean outs of drains in a timely/quarterly/bi annually/annually manner to prevent flooding on city streets during storms, BUT the COB thinks they have the capacity to become landlords now?? Give me a break…

  39. resident

    Frightening. My mother used to use the term “a pig in a poke” for stupidity like this.

  40. Concerned

    More and more government intervention of free markets has never led to a better world.
    This country was not founded on government leadership of the economy but upon a government that would allow its citizens the freedom to succeed (or fail) on their own.
    The great, and very successful to date, American experiment is being threatened by the proven failed policies of more government intervention of free markets.

  41. just visiting

    So no antitrust laws, no interstate highway system, no labor laws, no environmental laws, no food safety, no air traffic control,…the list of government intervention in the free market is long and distinguished.
    These all made the world worse? That’s a stunning argument.
    I don’t know if the City made the right or the wrong decision on this and–probably like you–haven’t studied the issue the way the City staff and council did before voting on it, but the concept that any government intervention is bad is just plain wrong.

  42. resident

    Just visiting inadvertently just made Concerned’s point even stronger. Everything Just Visiting noted was to benefit everyone in society not some select few except perhaps the labor law part which as we can see is not working out very well for the taxpayers who have to fund crazy public pension costs.

  43. Joe

    Rent control takes another beat down statewide:
    California voters handily rejected a ballot measure Tuesday that would have rolled back state limits on rent control, the second such measure in three years.
    Only about four in 10 voters supported Proposition 21, as of the late-night tally. The initiative, which required a simple majority to pass, would have expanded the housing eligible to be covered by local rent regulations, including newer buildings, single-family homes and apartments vacated by their tenants.
    The proposition was the sequel to a more sweeping attempt in 2018 to repeal the Costa-Hawkins Rental Housing Act, a 1995 law that restricts how cities can curb rent increases. The 2018 initiative failed by nearly 20 percentage points — a gap that paralleled the 2020 reprise.
    https://www.sfchronicle.com/politics/article/Prop-21-Ballot-measure-for-rent-control-lagging-15699645.php

  44. Libertarian

    Free Markets have recenty led to a significant (over 30% in SF) reduction in rents since last year.
    Rent Control, and Marxists Cindy and Dunham, had nothing to do with this market adjustment. Their past efforts, if successful, would have limited this market driven benefit to renters.
    The CA population has wisely spoken. Still be aware of the CA Legislature defying their constituents with more lifetime politician stupidity pandering to the uninformed, such as C and D.

  45. Barking Dog

    According to Jordan Grimes, Dumdum’s comrade @ Peninsula for Everyone they are going to continue pushing rent control.
    Buffoons
    Keep pissing into the wind guys
    https://mobile.twitter.com/cafedujord/with_replies?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor

  46. Barking Dog

    https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-03-02/berlin-s-rent-controls-are-proving-to-be-the-disaster-we-feared?utm_source=url_link

  47. Joe

    Love this guy:
    Editor,
    The Daily Journal front page Feb. 25 had two articles saying we have a housing shortage, yet everywhere I look there are For Rent signs.
    Most buildings have multiple vacancies, rents have dropped substantially and many landlords are offering a month or more free with a year lease. This doesn’t seem like a housing shortage from what I see. Either our elected official don’t get out much or they have been influenced by their donors from the building industry.
    Tim Donnelly
    Burlingame
    https://www.smdailyjournal.com/opinion/letters_to_editor/disconnect/article_6271fb70-7a4e-11eb-a13d-bf97c632750e

  48. Laura

    The Daily Journal is a joke these days. This article and others are written without checking any facts at all. It’s like they are getting paid by certain groups to write articles with misleading information. Anyone walking or driving around can see the “for rent” signs popping up every where. Whose agenda is the SM Daily Journal pushing this week? That’s the question to ask.

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