Rent control seems unlikely in Glendale but additional affordable housing may ease burden on renters

Rent control may not be the right way to tackle rising apartment lease costs in Glendale some City Council members said Tuesday, but they added that other possibilities, such as creating more affordable housing units, might be a better option.

More than 60% of local residents are renters and 57% of them are cost-burdened because they spend at least a third of their monthly income on rent, according to a city staff report.

In Glendale, the median monthly rental rate was $1,309 in 2014, while it was $1,433 in neighboring Burbank and $1,410 in Pasadena, the report stated.

The local rental market is currently unregulated by the city, and landlords are allowed to raise monthly prices whenever they like as opposed to the city of Los Angeles, which enacted rent control in 1978.

But even with the annual schedule of increases in L.A., rents there have jumped by around 60% compared to Glendale’s 54%, Philip Lanzafame, the city’s community development director, told council members.

While apartment owners in Los Angeles are not allowed to implement large rent hikes such as those in Glendale, the prices do eventually catch up, he said.

“Rent control doesn’t necessarily keep the rent down or make it more affordable,” Lanzafame said.

More than a dozen landlords were at the meeting and most said they’ve had some tenants for decades because they haven’t been egregiously raising rents.

Others said that artificially setting rents could cut a landlord’s income to the point where they can’t afford repairs or other administrative costs.

“Rather than putting this burden on the landlords and property owners, let’s see if there’s a mechanism that you can find to spread the burden over everybody,” said Greg Astorian, president of the Glendale Assn. of Realtors. “We’re in this all together, and I think that might be more fair.”

Councilman Vartan Gharpetian said he hears from residents regularly about fast-rising rents and gave an example of a woman whose monthly rent went from $950 to $1,450 in one increase.

He called the practice of people buying apartment buildings and immediately raising rents “predatory” because it’s extremely difficult for most people to adjust their income level in the course of a month or two.

While he didn’t specifically support rent control, Gharpetiandid say he thinks everybody would calm down if there was an environment where people would know how much their rents would be in two years.

He said the issue is ultimately going to come down to a balance between escalating rents and the landlords who raise them.

Lanzafame presented eight scenarios that council members said they want to review more closely.

The first would be to place an impact fee on developers and use that revenue source to pay for new affordable housing, according to a city staff report. A similar program currently exists where impact fees go toward local parks.

Another would be to place a measure on a ballot to add 1,200 affordable housing units by initiating a new bond, which would cost a single-family homeowner $100 a year and the average renter $2.

What’s also being explored is initiating mandatory building inspections when a landlord raises rents to ensure tenants live in safe and sanitary housing. That effort would be funded through a new business registration or license fee, according to the staff report.

Councilwoman Laura Friedman spoke against rent control, saying it’s good for the people who are around for the first round of it, but once someone moves out, the landlord can immediately raise the rent to the market rate.

“If you’re young or a new family or new resident moving to the area, then you pay a much higher rent to live in that community,” she said. “I don’t think that’s going to get us to long-term, stabilized housing for residents.”

Mayor Paula Devine also said she doesn’t think rent control is the answer, and the solution may lie in creating more affordable housing.

City staff members are expected to write a more detailed report outlining the eight options to tackle rent affordability at the council meeting Aug. 16.