patrick.net

Ok, it's official. We can finally put to bed one of the perma-bull/Trolls' favorite myths: rents are not about to shoot up and correct the price-to-rent imbalance all by itself. And, oh, we're not all going to work for Google and become Googleaires. Or marry supermodels... or live forever. Sorry to burst anyone's bubble. ;-)

HARM

Sacramento Bee
By Jim Wasserman - Bee Staff Writer
January 19, 2007
Story appeared in BUSINESS section, Page D3
An oversupply of units has held down prices locally.

Sacramento-area renters ruled the region's apartment complexes during 2006, seeing rents rise by only 2.3 percent compared with much larger hikes across the rest of California, a new survey shows.

Renters of 77,500 apartments in El Dorado, Placer, Sacramento and Yolo counties paid average rents ranging from $700 for a studio to $1,355 for a three-bedroom two-bath unit as the year ended, according to Novato-based RealFacts, an apartment industry tracker.

The survey showed an average rent in the four counties of $948 in larger apartment communities during the fourth quarter of 2006. That was unchanged from summer. Capital-area rents have increased just 9 percent over the past four years.

...Instead, analysts say rents have been held down by continuing oversupply of rental units after years of new apartment construction. Add to it the growing number of single-family homes now available to rent.

"A lot of people can't sell their homes, and they put them on the (rental) market," said Bruce Mills, owner of Sacramento-based M&M Properties, a rental manager

ABC7.com
LOS ANGLEES, January 18, 2007
Landlords Lowering Apartment Rates, Offering Incentives

Some Southern California landlords are lowering asking rents and offering move-in incentives, while vacancy rates are rising -- all signs the market may be softening, it was reported Thursday.

Average vacancy rates at major complexes rose in most of the Southland during the fourth quarter, while the rate of annualized rent increases slowed in many locales, the Los Angeles Times reported based on data being released Thursday by RealFacts, a Novato, Calif.-based research firm.

...But "there's a point at which you push beyond where people can afford the price and you run into resistance," John Husing of the consulting firm Economics & Politics Inc. in Riverside told The Times. "In supply and demand terms, the sign that the price has gotten too high is when you start seeing vacancies go up in the rental market, and inventories go up in the housing market."

...The trend is most apparent in the Inland Empire. After years of strong rent growth, including a 7.4 percent annual gain in the fourth quarter of 2005, the Riverside-San Bernardino County region saw rent growth climb 4.9 percent in the latest quarter to $1,141 from a year earlier, while the occupancy rate dipped 0.2 of a percentage point.

What's more, between the third and fourth quarters, the occupancy fell 3.7 percentage points. That was the biggest quarter-to-quarter drop for any of the 28 markets covered by RealFacts, which surveys landlords of buildings with 100 units or more in 15 states.

"Such widespread declines in occupancy likely herald reductions in rent growth rates," according to a RealFacts summary.

Some experts believe average rents may be lower, because RealFacts surveys landlords about their asking rents, not the final agreement they make with tenants.

New York Times
January 16, 2007
Buyers Scarce, Many Condos Are for Rent

…In some cases, developers are even turning older buildings back to rentals after a brief or aborted attempt at condo conversion. Meanwhile, another 2,500 proposed condominiums in the Washington area have been scrapped altogether, according to Delta Associates, a real estate research firm.

…Industry analysts also point out that rents may start sagging if too many condos are converted into apartments too quickly. While rents were rising at a robust 6.1 percent annual pace in the Washington area late last year, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, some buildings in the suburbs have recently started promoting move-in specials and other incentives to lure renters.

National Real Estate Investor
Jan 1, 2007
Mr. Fix It

“It’s so competitive out there for value-added deals right now that many investors are making aggressive assumptions about projected rent growth,” says Dr. Sam Chandan, chief economist at Reis Inc., who warns that extreme optimism may be clouding some investors’ judgment.

Chandan expects a flood of condos-for-rent to dampen rental growth in 2007. He’s also calling for a jump in new completions to slow the pace of rent growth. While he expects the final tally on 2006 asking and effective rents to show 4.1% and 4.2% growth respectively (year-end figures weren’t available in late December), he anticipates slower growth in 2007. Chandan predicts that asking and effective rents will grow by 3.4% and 3.6% respectively in 2007.

…What effect, if any, will failed condo projects have on the rental market? Some analysts call these “repartments,” or former apartments briefly converted into condos before becoming rentals again.

#housing