Anyone who has tried to schedule an Uber in recent weeks knows that the prices of goods and services in Los Angeles are rapidly recovering from their pandemic lows.
Rent is no exception to this market rebound, and prices have been rising steadily since April when the daily vaccination rate peaked and Angelenos grew optimistic about the ‘return to normal.’
According to the latest report from apartment rental platform Zumper, median one-bedroom apartment rent rose 1.5 percent from May to June, reaching $2,000 per month. That’s a $40 price jump in just one months’ time.
One-bedroom rent was still down 7.0 percent compared to June 2020, but the year-over-year price gap is narrowing. Los Angeles currently ranks as the sixth most expensive rental market in the country for one-bedroom apartments.
The median two-bedroom rental fetched $2,750 per month in June, up 3.0 percent from the previous month, which equates to an $80 price difference. Two-bedroom rent remained 7.1 percent below year-ago levels, but prices have been quickly gaining ground since the reopening of California’s economy on June 15th.
Nationally, rents are climbing even faster as demand returns to expensive cities. Median one-bedroom rent jumped 4.9 percent annually, while two-bedroom rent surged 6.5 percent.
“This is significant because for much of 2019, rents nationally were flat,” wrote Zumper data analyst Jeff Andrews, who authored the report. “In 2020, rent growth consistently hovered around 1 percent, even as the home sales market was on fire.”
Ten markets across the country saw monthly rent hikes of more than five percent, led by Irving, TX (5.4 percent), San Francisco, CA (5.3 percent), Madison, WI (5.3 percent), Des Moines, IA (5.2 percent), and Reno, NV (5.2 percent).
Meantime, Los Angeles rents are largely expected to continue increasing throughout the summer, although if or when they will return to pre-pandemic levels remains to be seen.
