Average rent in San Diego County areas (Marina: neighborhood, buying)

[jksouthbay88]

Originally Posted by mysticaltyger

San Francisco has rent control and rents there are very high. Bottom line is they need to increase the housing supply by actually building more. What a lot of people don't see is that most places in California have all kinds of red tape and restrictions when it comes to building new housing, which limits supply and keeps rents and home prices high.

Never thought of that.Makes a lot of sense though.

[JosephineBeth]

Interesting. These are much lower than what I paid the last few years. I moved to the East Coast last year (DC area suburbs). In San Diego (Mira Mesa) I had a 782 sq ft 2 bedroom apartment in a huge complex (pools, tiny gym, decent). Appliances were all original from 1984 (when it was built) except water heater that was a 2002 model. Carpet was old, patched and very cheap. Fixtures fell off all the time and the plumbing required maintenance at least 2x monthly. It was all very standard (lived in San Diego 23 years and most as rental this was common for me). Covered parking at least which was nice. Cost? $1642 per month and I paid trash, water, electric/gas. The storage closet on the balcony did have room for stackable washer/dryer which I had and we had laundry rooms.

In the DC burb I live in now I have a 2 bedroom 2 story townhouse with a huge yard. 920 sq ft so it's not huge. Nice hardwood floors, granite countertops, all new appliances, remodeled bathroom, quality fixtures. Parking space only (drag!) but lots of storage (an attic! woohoo!). In a beautiful almost wooded area 2 blocks from library, grocery, arts center, fitness center. Cost: $1600 and I only pay electric.

The cost is roughly even since water in San Diego was pretty high cost compared to here in MD. Electric is higher here due to winter and such. Though I LOVE that I can run my A/C all summer here and pay $85 a month. In CA if I ran the A/C it was $150 a month minimum.

Overall the same cost but I get a lot more for my money here. That would be different if I were to live in the District. I'm in the burbs but a historic one. I live close to the Metro so have easy access to DC whenever I need.

I'm bummed for my friends in San Diego if rents are going up!

[sdlife619]

It's becoming unreal here. My rent just went up early this year, when I haven't had any changes made to it in the last 4 years. These effing landlords are getting greedier, they don't understand how hard it is for someone when rent goes up even by $100. That's extra money that I would other wise have for food, gas, utilities or a variety of things. SD does need some sort of law, or rent control to protect renters from this kind of evil tactic that many landlords use to either remove certain types of people from their complex which is morally wrong, or because they feel like it's time to raise rents all because the market says that they can charge more because of it.

Another issue I see a lot, is anytime older apartments are being remodeled, most likely the rents will usually go up. The owners have to somehow pay for that remodeling job, so they jack up the rents and keep them sky high for good. They want to attract more people with money, by slowly vacating previous renters that are less desirable.

So if you can't afford a $1,400 a month for dinky size Apt with no amenities, you are somehow not human to landlords and considered low lives? It's crazy!


I have mixed feelings regarding the whole supply and demand notion that if we just went on a building spree, the San Diego housing prices, including rents would magically go down due to the increase in supply. Well I would like to believe that, but when you see new condo's or apartments going up and prices are not affordable when new, what makes anybody think that older apartment rentals will drop in price?

If the new housing was more affordable and very reasonable for people, then you would see prices go down for older APT's in SD especially if amenities were added to them. But this isn't happening, usually when new housing is constructed, they have all the bells and whistle's which automatically leads to higher prices. I have yet to see brand new apartments built that doesn't have a bunch of extra amenities attached to them that people would rather trade away for, for lower rents.

To put its simple, we need more apartments or condo's with less luxury living items to keep prices low, but this will never happen in a day in age where we expect more than just a unit. Now in every new housing project, we gotta have a gym,, spa/pools, gaming rooms, lounges, underground parking, high end appliances and so on.

That is why I am leaving this place for good very soon, and SD altogether.

[loveautumn]

stats are deceiving too...article in paper a few weeks ago said average price is $1,400, but stats are usually based on a 2-bedroom. You can hardly find a nice, one bedroom for that price these days...

[tonyinsd]

As someone who is both a landlord and a renter, I see it both ways.

Why shouldn't I charge market rates for the apartment? I've got a commodity and if someone wants to buy that product for x dollars, why should I charge x-10 percent? It's a business, and I'd be a fool to not charge market rent because there will come a time where the market is slow and I'll have a hard time getting that kind of money for it.

On the other hand, I realize what kind of a hassle it can be for a tenant if you raise the rent. But if my cost of maintenance, including utilities, is going up, then I need to make up for that. Fortunately for me, the place I'm renting from will keep my rent the same for two and a half years, and by then, I will have hopefully bought a place. But if they did raise the rent, I'd understand. I'd be unhappy about it, but I'd pay up.

[earlyretirement]

Originally Posted by tonyinsd

As someone who is both a landlord and a renter, I see it both ways.

Why shouldn't I charge market rates for the apartment? I've got a commodity and if someone wants to buy that product for x dollars, why should I charge x-10 percent? It's a business, and I'd be a fool to not charge market rent because there will come a time where the market is slow and I'll have a hard time getting that kind of money for it.

I totally agree that rentals are simply based on supply and demand. It doesn't make sense for owners to charge much lower than supply and demand market rates dictate. That being said, as a landlord, I'd still prefer to remain competitive and keep my properties full.

Most successful landlords understand this and won't totally gauge their clients. Still, with inflation it's necessary most times to slightly increase rental rates in many areas.

On my properties, I haven't raised rates in 5 years. Even though I definitely could, I keep them the same to remain competitive and keep occupancy up and cash flow coming in.

But definitely rental rates in most areas are going up and I don't blame landlords for doing that if that is where the market is. That being said, if I had a good long-term tenant that took excellent care of the property, I'd probably just keep the rates the same or just do a slight increase.

Like Tony mentioned, it's simply a "business" for most landlords.

[Willy702]

I always get a kick out of people who claim raising rents is gouging. Go get a dictionary and learn what the term means before throwing it out there.

In a market where it has almost always cost more to buy than rent the only way it theoretically makes sense to be a landlord is to get regular rent increases. Otherwise landlording doesnt make sense, that landlord has to recoup years of losses or breaking even to justify the risk he took. Providing housing is not a charitable activity and it never should be.

[earlyretirement]

Originally Posted by Willy702

I always get a kick out of people who claim raising rents is gouging. Go get a dictionary and learn what the term means before throwing it out there.

In a market where it has almost always cost more to buy than rent the only way it theoretically makes sense to be a landlord is to get regular rent increases. Otherwise landlording doesnt make sense, that landlord has to recoup years of losses or breaking even to justify the risk he took. Providing housing is not a charitable activity and it never should be.

This is also why I totally dismiss the permabears that say you should never buy and just rent a place. Perhaps the biggest advantage of buying is your payments are locked in for many years until you have the property paid off. So there is stability in knowing what your payments will be over the long term. With the especially added bonus, when you are older and retired and have less/little income coming in, you have a property that is completely paid off.

Inflation is definitely going to be a bigger factor in the future. You can't keep printing endless amounts of money with no recourse in the future. So I definitely see rental rates continuing to go up heading into the future. Especially in desirable cities and desirable areas of desirable cities.

[1AngryTaxPayer]

The wife and I were discussing what to do if either of us lost our job long term and first thing was we couldn't afford to sell the house as rent would be double what we are paying now. That's just wacked.

[shmoov_groovzsd]

Sorry for the re-post, but this was probably the more appropriate thread

As far as rents go....
I was just visiting some friends at my old building in the Marina District downtown. Here is what I was told by the HOA President who also privately manages some of the units as rentals.

The demand is VERY high and prices, outrageous. She is able to rent a 1 bd/1ba + Den for $2200/mo. almost immediately. The main problem with downtown and buying for some buildings at the moment is that HOA's are shaky all over. Very high delinquency rates for HOA dues and some trying to get out of it completely when attempting to short sell. So if you are in the market for condo downtown, its absolutely something you need to look into and one of the top reasons I never bought down there. Just WAY too many investors jumped in and left the HOAs hanging and having to go to court etc.

There is almost nothing for sale in the building. The last sale was a 2bd/2ba for just under 400k (which is a steal in this building).

Right now in my particular part of Lemon Grove (yes there are nice parts) I did a rental comparison and I could easily fetch ~2k for rent. Whereas my mortgage is a little over 1k.

The rental market is ridiculous everywhere right now, not just SD. Rents in denser metro markets are astronomical.

In SD the buyers market is hot as well for well priced and homes in great condition in all zips near freeways. So in some ways, it can be a sellers market depending on the owners position with the house (15+ years into mortgage or owned outright).

IMHO, SD will always have a hot rental market especially in areas like downtown or by the beach. Outside of that in the suburbs, it should be either good schools or access to public transit to warrant a higher rental price.
I still dont think SD will ever have a long view for people that come here to work or earn enough to buy for the long term. Its just too volatile of a business market except for 'maybe' some tech or military. Just for my experience, at least half of the people that I have met in business leave for greener pastures elsewhere outside of CA. These are easily six figure type white collar workers.The problem there is that where they are moving the rents have increased as well so when you do the math, its about even. What it obviously doesnt account for is potential growth in a company and increased wages.