Moving

Are San Francisco rents rising or falling? Is determined by whom you ask

Vaccine appointments are open, spring flowers are in bloom, and San Francisco tech giants like Salesforce are planning the return of their employees.

If all of this seems like a recipe for a renewed spike in city rents, conflicting data and ongoing fears for both landlords and tenants point to a more complicated reality.

“Most of the landlords I speak to panic about the market,” said Ray Amouzandeh, Principal Agent at Targa Residential Brokerage. “They say ‘God, is anyone renting?'”

In one point they are.

San Francisco rents rose 3% in April to an average of $ 2,157 for a one-bedroom apartment, according to the Apartment List property listing. However, another report on the Zumper listing found that San Francisco rents were down 1.9% from the previous month, and they charged a higher average price of $ 2,600 for the same size apartment.

So what is it And what does that mean for both the Bay Area’s normally busy summer moving season and the thousands of local renters still seeking financial relief after the economic aftermath of the pandemic?

With the explosion of online real estate sites, deciphering ever-changing rental rates has become an art form. The main differences are usually what type of property is included and whether economists analyze the price landlords charge versus the prices renters end up paying.

Apartment List combines Census median rental reports with data on multiple rental listings to weed out brand new units that can skew higher numbers. Zumper analyzes its current online housing offers and includes new rentals.

“We’re trying to get closer:” What is the average rent in San Francisco, regardless of what mechanism you use to rent an apartment? “Said Rob Warnock, senior research associate at Apartment List in San Francisco. And even with the more measured approach, he said, one thing is clear:” Rents are recovering. “

Amouzandeh said it depends on which part of town you’re talking about. He’s starting to see window cleaners returning to the tech offices near his downtown apartment, but he’s also just negotiated a 20% discount with his own landlord. However, all over town in Bernal Heights there is more competition to rent standalone homes and cottages.

Apartment List found that rents in San Francisco are still more than 19% lower than last April, although prices continue to be significantly higher than other major cities like New York, Los Angeles, and Seattle. Zumper reported that asking rents were down nearly 25% from last April, calculating an even bigger 30% decrease in nearby Redwood City and a 28% decrease in Facebook’s Menlo Park home.

Other Bay Area cities where rents seem steeper include Berkeley, Emeryville, and Union City, where Apartment List’s prices have increased 3% to 4% in the last month.

“In terms of transactions, we’ve doubled our number of leases signed every month since November,” said Amouzandeh. “I’m an optimist so I think we’ll probably get it all back by the end of 2022.”

While things may be going well for some landlords, it is far less clear how confusing the eviction moratorium and rent relief programs can be for tenants in San Francisco who are hardest hit by job losses and instabilities caused by pandemic standstills.

Just last week, local faith leaders organized a sit-in at the San Francisco Mayor’s Housing and Community Development office to highlight the inability of thousands of predominantly black and Latin American families to access promised local rent reliefs. Tenants Together communications and legislative director Shanti Singh says rent increases are also returning, and voice access is another major barrier to emergency programs.

“We know people are falling through the cracks,” said Singh, and that many who lost their jobs during the pandemic went into debt to try to stay housed. These invoices will be due in the coming months.

“It’s chaos now,” she said.

Lauren Hepler is an employee of the San Francisco Chronicle. Email: lauren.hepler@sfchronicle.com; Twitter: @LAHepler

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