Bay Area’s ‘happy renters’
will fall victim to a bad law

Re: “Renters in Oakland, San Jose among the happiest in the U.S.” and “San Jose weakens rent control ordinance” (both Page B1, Nov. 12):

We’re going to “fix” the happy renters in San Jose. California’s new rent control law will cause landlords who haven’t raised rents (to keep good renters) rethink their policy of leaving rent alone. Landlords cannot “bank” the increase for the future. They have to take it or lose it.

All those “happy renters” in the Bay Area are going to fall victim to a bad law that was written to house more people without building more units, an impossibility. Why do I say there won’t be more units? Because the secondary money markets that buy apartment buildings run scared from rent-controlled buildings. The new law will slow or outright kill new construction. Contractors build then sell. They don’t manage.

We cannot balance the growth of the Bay Area on the backs of some tiny percentage of landlords with any expectation of success. We are a market economy.

Adrienne Regard
San Jose

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