do you think rental prices for apartments will go down? (Bloomfield: low income, section 8)

[shoortie]

currently looking for apartments in jc/hoboken/surrounding areas for a one year lease to start in August 2008. do people think the rental prices for apartments will go down this summer b/c of the mortgage prices? one place i like wants me to sign the lease NOW (no payment until I move in), but i am afraid i am just locking myself at a higher price. thanks!!

[Alex07860]

IMO prices for rental should remain steady, with the RE market as it is, people are more willing to rent than buy (altough it is a buyer's market) waiting for home prices to come down further. I don't see rentals coming down in prices unless it's a development that was initially constructed as sales unit but because of the housing market have remained empty, if this is your scenario, I'd wait to see how long it takes them to fill the units. at the same time, you mention jc/hoboken which are very populated areas so there's no shortage of tenants.

[juliann1977]

IMO prices for rental should remain steady, with the RE market as it is, people are more willing to rent than buy (altough it is a buyer's market) waiting for home prices to come down further. I don't see rentals coming down in prices unless it's a development that was initially constructed as sales unit but because of the housing market have remained empty, if this is your scenario, I'd wait to see how long it takes them to fill the units. at the same time, you mention jc/hoboken which are very populated areas so there's no shortage of tenants.

I agree. JC and Hoboken are excellent rental markets, so I'd be shocked if rentals were to come down in price. I'd actually expect them to increase, if anything, given a lot of people, who might have been buying a few years ago, are renting.

[TrishP7]

I agree with Alex and Julian. JC and Hoboken is right at the border of NY..thats a major perk and alot of NYorkers are willing to pay the high rental prices in comparison to what they would pay in New York. So lots of them relocate to that area. Jersey all around is very expensive. I used to live in Bloomfield, NJ..expensive is an under statement. For a 2 bedroom apartment, I paid..starting 1200, live there for about 4.5 years. By time I left, I was paying 1300! It was not worth it at all. Nice neighborhood but the home was extremely small..landlord was for the birds..did not maintain the home at all. I went as far as contacting the Board of Health on these bastards. In either case, I say all that to say that Jersey is very expensive..youre better off living in the south of Jersey. Put it this way..I relocated to FL about 3 weeks ago because the cost of living in Jersey is so high. Good luck with your search! P.S. I found out that the piece of crap of a landlord, re rented my apartment for 1400!!!!!!!!!! Thats just horrible.

[jy_2007]

home prices and rental rates have an inverse relationship.

Rentals came down over the last few years while everyone was buying - noone wanted to rent. I would expect rents to increase in the near future...

[girl-973-908-732]

Landlords can be ridiculous. They want renters to pay their mortgage for them, the utilities and anything else they can squeeze out of you. I think rents will never ever come down, unless you get on section 8 or low income housing, you can probably expect to pay a lot. I guess it's a good thing for the landlords tho'.

How many landlords are in this forum? Everyone seems to be a homeowner but no landlords here.

[Sergio M]

Landlord here. I've been keeping my rents steady, however with the taxes going up every year and the added maintainence and increase in water rates, I cannot see how I can prevent an increase.