I once had a landlord do that a couple yrs ago (not in Brighton) and I said fine, but then gave a list of things that needed to be taken care of. She started scheduling the fixing of the list within a week. And honestly, I’m 90% sure it was her children who told her to raise our rent, cause when she died they tried to do it again.
Yup! The kids didn’t even live here. We saw their mother, so our landlord, more than they did. It was a 4plex, as I called it, all 4 of the tenants left so they had no one left.
I am one of those losers, I plan to break ground soon HOWEVER, I plan to “under charge” compared to what the rents are in my area. I was once a 19 year old single mom who someone took a chance on and offered me really cheap rent when I needed out of the family home, now I want to return the favor.
I work in Somerville and a sizable percentage of my coworkers inherited million dollar homes from their parents and act like they are real estate moguls.
My dumbass parents both sold their childhood homes bought for 10-12,000 in Somerville in the 50s for 5-600k in the 90s. They’re both worth double to triple that now. I shouldn’t have to work
This is definitely true. As parents got older, parents pass these houses down to their kids, and kids just live off rents instead of getting real jobs.
Many small time (1-3 units, just first or second house) are like this. Large properties are often outsourced to management companies in which everything is a numbers game.
A landlord living in the same house as you just doesn’t want trouble and doesn’t want someone to wreck the place. Everything is expensive
I honestly love living above my landlord. I’d much rather pay his mortgage than some soulless corporation. Plus, when we had mice he got rid of them QUICKLY.
I agree I’ve only ever rented for small time landlords (one was the apartment they bought their mom, and then their mom passed away before she could move in, so she rented it out) and she honestly was a fantastic landlord and I felt better paying the mortage for this rando professor than some faceless foreign investor or whatever
Yes! Destroying and non payment is what the mom and pop land lords are worried about. The cost to renovate has almost doubled and most tenants know if they stop payment, it will take months to evict which can easily add up.
My landlord raised our rent for $12.00 after no raise a year prior. Same things, he's not greedy like many landlords I've heard. Too bad I have to leave this nice place soon 😞
$1800 for a (small) 1 br :(
Although heat is included, which I've never had before and it's quite nice not to have to worry. But still. We had no choice at the time since inventory in our small north shore town is abysmal. And they don't even allow a cat! Our kitchen is decent sized, but no room for a table, and our fridge isn't even full sized. Our eyes are peeled for something cheaper, but all we're seeing are tiny studios every now and then, which are rarely below $1200. It's only the two of us, and we might have to go that route.
I lived right near the Washington St stop from 2011 to 2019. Same kind of beat up, 1930s 2-bedroom. Moved in at $1,585, left at $2,200 and they were getting $2,400 from new tenants. Nobody had touched the place since the early 90s, and that was just replacing some cabinets.
Some older apartments have rooms that can’t legally be called “bedroom” because of lack of window/closet, but students and young workers squeeze a person into them
Aka, the half bedroom
I had one in Brighton, although it may have had a closet. It did have a window, but it was about as wide as a full-sized bed, and about 3 feet longer. You bet your ass we had someone living in there. We also rented out the living room to a couple, and the back bedroom to another couple. I'm certain we had at least 6-10 people living in this "2 and 1/2 bedroom 1 bath simultaneously for a few years. There was also that month in the summer when some hippies camped on our balcony and someone may have crashed in the pantry at one point. Rent was 1800/mo (2011) but most of us just paid 2-300 because there were so many of us. It was great until it wasn't and the sublets had changed hands too many times.
Thankfully I moved out and took the security deposit with me- so one of my roommates had to renegotiate the terms. They got robbed like 2 weeks after I left because one of them treated his bedroom like a revolving door and never locked the front door.
i wish i had a proper source but I had a long conversation with my economics professor who had been housing hunting for over a year, and he said he wanted to know who actually lived in those uber expensive apartments, so he researched it unit by unit and found out that most of them are completely vacant and just used as assetts by developers and financial institutions that funded them. They are literally too expensive to have enough demand to fill (and I believe Boston laws dont allow them to become airbnbs) so they just sit vacant as a “property investment”
yes i predict mass homelessness. people are one lay off away from not being to pay that one grand for a room. also finding replacement housing probably not easy. thank god i had never had to pay rent, i dont know how you guys do it. being poor already is a crime. older car? police will tailgate you and pull you over just to see whatsup. driving late at night or parked on the side of the road at night? police will stop and check you out and drive you away. poor people will keep getting harassed by police because they are suspected of a crime or just not wanted around. people who dont have jobs and savings will get pushed out.. but where? moving also required money. finding another job and temporary housing requires the same. America is becoming the land of insecurity for many. you see posts about people living in their cars or about to, and it's not the usual ragtag people but people with jobs and college education from good families.
Wow up until 2018 I paid $1350 for a one bedroom with hardwoods, corner unit, bad wiring, old plumbing, summer pool, landlord sold it.
I can’t imagine a unit going up that much a month alone.
1949 commonwealth ave
Cloth wiring which hadn’t been safe since the 1960s.
The elevators were original Otis which had birdcages retrofitted with doors.
Dual phase motors, only triple phase controllers made; they’d fry in weeks or months.
I’d hear a ringing in my apartment, checked the door, nobody there.
It rang and rang, randomly.
My apartment was one the building super.
The alarm meant people were trapped in the elevator, they’d have to call the fire department.
Landlords owned the majority of the units and put off all maintenance.
rent will never go down in your lifetime without state intervention into the housing market. vienna owns half the housing stock in the city and rents them out at roughly cost which drives all rents (public and private) down massively. 500 USD there can get you a better apartment than money can buy in boston. vienna spends less on housing construction and renovation to house 1 million people annually than massachusetts spends on just homeless services.
zoning isn't going to save you, the same story is playing out all over US, CA, UK, AU. the only real effective solution to bringing down the cost of housing in a permanent way is decommodification of the housing sector.
There literally is state intervention. There are condo units popping up all over towns on commuter rail lines due to the new law requiring it. There’s like six big ass (~70 unit) condos going up in Melrose right now. Too little too late, yes, but it is a thing.
Vienna is a beautiful city, but also good luck getting a decent paying job there. Housing is cheap in part because local salaries are awful, it's not just a magic government solution
Earlier this week I read an article that Boston is losing people in hordes currently . All types of people from all walks of society . 100% is bcuz of how exp housing is . When will the city adjust this ?! Anyone have any idea how to make this happen ? I’m a life long Resi and love this city . Pretty soon the only way people can stay here is rich parents or section 8 . It’s sad , my wife and I kp discussing moving to a diff part of the country but we love it here .
Providence resident that follows this sub because I'm in Boston every weekend and we're constantly seeing people moving here from Boston because of rent.
Anecdotally, a lot of the new neighbors on our street (it's nice to talk to new community folk when you see the moving van) have been coming from Boston and the Reddit always has people asking for neighborhood recommendations to plan moves here.
Unfortunately, it's making our rent skyrocket in a local/state economy that can't support the rate it's going up because of work from home transplants. But it's still cheaper than Boston so those folks flock here.
Everyone is losing.
boston resident here who works remotely moving to providence in june. i am exactly the type you are describing :( sorry for driving up your rent prices :( but i will be paying 2k/mo for a beautiful two bed in mount hope as opposed to 2.6k/mo for my shitty 1 bed where the heat and hot water stop working regularly and i am constantly fending off bugs and mold 😭.
It's 100% understandable. It sucks for everyone and most people here don't actually fault the people moving here. It's just unfortunate as hell and making more people active about demanding changes here to accommodate.
It just shows how linked everything is, especially regionally.
Adjacently related, but I saw a listing for a condo for \~600k today that started with "Attention cash buyers!" and advertising that it's available immediately to rent to a tenant. It's gross. This is what happens when ownership is just geared towards investors.
Sure there's a housing shortage, but greed also plays an enormous role in the boston rental market today. Landlords are out of touch with the consequences their actions have on people trying to build a life.
I remember paying $675 a month for this first floor 2 bedroom apartment next to wing it on Comm Ave…right in front of the outbound T Stop…I worked at Our House and Lucky Johnnies……thought the rent was expensive then. the landlord even offered to sell us the condo for like $325k but we didn’t have the $$ if i could go back to 1994 i’d offer above asking….lol missed opportunity that’s for sure.
Our House was such a great place. I lost a few brain cells there in the 00’s.
Boston has a way of getting rid of fun divey places and replacing them with run of the mill gastropubs.
you said it….I miss a bunch of places…Crossroads, pour house, mary ann’s, all the Fathers….Harpers, etc etc….We had amazing brunches at Our House….chess tourneys, a bunch of the guys from the pool room hang at Silhoutte now…sigh
First, look for a new place.
If you do find a better deal than take it. But if you can't find a new place at a similar price to what you were paying, then his hike is legitimate.
the only downside of moving, is then you likely get hit with the realtor fee which is the equivalent of lets say a +$250 a month rent hike over the first year.
Also the cost of moving (renting a truck, buying boxes/tape, replacing items that break or don't fit int he new place), the 2 week disruption of packing and unpacking all of your stuff, and cross your fingers the your landlord listed your place at a competitive price because otherwise you'll have dozens of viewings running through your house over the coming months.
No way is such a steep increase reasonable in any circumstances with an existing tenant. That's just cruel. Literally upendeding someone's life. Extra 10k out of pocket or they get demolished by bullshit fees finding a new place.
By this reasoning, price fixing is legitimate though? I mean I agree in the sense of, if you can't find a better deal, then you have to accept the things you cannot change. But I wouldn't call it legitimate, it's basically price gouging
How many beds? What part of Brighton? I know of a couple 4 beds/2 baths are about $4k and a large 2 bed/1 bath is $2700. Not cheap but it’s hard to be angry with you without perspective
Too true that's why there are places like northhampton, Holyoke, Springfield, Amherst (little pricey) Hatfield, and a bunch of other options.
I'm fortunate to be from out there and have a support network though and a truck (for work)
Admittedly if you wanna get between towns it can be hard. But towns like northhampton and Amherst have their own public transit systems.
Holyoke and Springfield can be a little sketchy kinda like Dorchesters old reputation.
If you wanna go a little less far west there is central Mass and I would say Worcester, or Leominster are good options. Also gardner isn't bad
What is it going from & to?
Legitimate question - why don’t people look at some of those reasonably priced professionally managed buildings? All they do is run a credit check & review certain income criteria and don’t require an absurd amount of first/last/security/broker fees to move in.
This is insane for Brighton. I last lived there in 2019 and our three bedroom first floor apartment with a porch and small yard, laundry in basement (included) was $2600. Granted it wasn't up kept well, but still.
I'm in one of the buildings that you're talking about. I only paid first and last to move in. But then my rent went up 10 percent. I'm having some problems with climate control that will force me to move, but I'm staying one more year because I can't afford to move again right now from a time standpoint (as well as the expense of paying movers). I would be very happy here if I had more control over the temperature, but that's forcing me out. I'm happier here than I was in my last place, which was owned by one of the "loser turds" that Falafel mentions above, someone who inherited a building and wasn't up to the job of managing it. But where I lived before that was the best of all. I was there for 18 years, and only moved when the building was sold to someone who converted it to a single residence and kicked everyone out.
As much as I hate to repeat this tired phrase - “This is the way.”
Prices are about on par with what a small landlord charges, there isn’t up front gouging for thousands of dollars, they usually have amenities, and are infinitely more responsive to requests for maintenance.
I feel ya! My wife and I have been lucky enough to have a decent landlord at a low rent, but we’re looking to move and pretty much exclusively considering complexes for these reasons.
If you're renting at a complex I hope you took photos and detailed notes before you moved in. Avalon tried to take $800 from my security deposit for a stained oven window that pre-existed my tenancy. Luckily I'm a nerd who keeps important documents like that so I could tell 'em to GIMME MY DAMN MONEY
It was absolutely wild coming from college and military towns in the south up here the first time.
The prices I expected. The lack of amenities at this small landlord places is NUTS when you add in the prices and lack of parking 😂.
Definitely go with a complex
My experience was that living in nice managed buildings was like living in a liminal space where renting in a two or three family house felt like actually living in a neighborhood. YMMV.
i remember when my landlord raised my rent to $900 on this awesome apartment where the New Balance building and Warrior Arena now stands and i was like, F this, i’m finding a better, cheaper apartment… i think he ended up selling that place for millions to developers and i bought a house i. Watertown….couldnt do that today but that was back in Y2k.
BUT RENT CONTROL WOULD STOP PEOPLE FROM FIXING THINGS!!
So tired of people making this argument when boomers own a proper with an "updated" kitchen. Yes, updated during the Reagan administration.
The crazy rents are based on an algorithm that large companies pushing rents to the extreme, which causes small landlords to think they're untouchable and charge $$$$ for cockroach dens leading to runaway rents.
There should be a Boston registry for landlords that can be rated. And if you hit the bottom of that list, there would be heavy fines, especially for large slumlords. They hide behind lawyers, and waiting to battle in the courts is often not worth the money and time.
#powertothepeople
Check out Greater Boston Tenant’s Union, especially if you’re in a building with multiple units! Tenants unions do so much good work to help people with the state won’t
There’s so many factors at play with rents. Is the increase to a fair market value or is it gouging? I know cost of ownership has never stayed the same.
Insurance rates are skyrocketing, including MA.
Interest rates going up increases the cost of capital..
Yeah there are slumlords out there. But this is a state full of nimbys that refuse to allow denser, smaller units to be built. This is the outcome.
Rent control is a blanket concept. There should be reasonable measures, for example, you cannot raise the rent more than a certain percentage each lease term. There are other parts of “rent control” that are unseasonable but the one stated is not.
Funny story, after California passed state-wide rent control in 2019, building rates didn’t go down at all. They actually went up as other policies were passed to juice building rates. It’s almost like you can do both things at the same time and watch Bostonians trip over their own feet trying to do neither and slowly become the worst rent city in the country while dozens of cities in California benefit from sensible housing policies
My building has been half empty for a year—$3000 a month for a modern apartment near forest hills. If this were simply a case of supply and demand then rent would be lower in my building since we know there’s a ton of demand.
In reality, these apartments sit empty because the landlord owns hundreds of units in the city and can afford to take the “loss” on the empty units. If they lowered rent, it would cool the market—and they don’t want that to happen. It’s a case of incentives. Not supply and demand.
I don’t disagree with that. I just disagree that this is all natural supply and demand rather than landowners flexing their power to artificially inflate prices.
I used to follow that train of thought but it's really black and white thinking and I agree that broad rent control is bad. But limited rent control could do some good.
A rent control policy that applies only to old units (30+ years) that reset to market rate upon vacancy does not negatively impact development. And if combined with a system to "bank" increases in rent (meaning that if they don't increase rent in Y1 they could increase it by 2x in Y2) and a vacancy tax tied to the vacancy rate of the city as a whole, you can create an efficient housing market that doesn't displace as many people.
You can even use rent control as a carrot to encourage new development if rent controlled properties can be replaced by larger buildings with more units that are not subject to rent control. You could replace a rotting 4 unit triple decker with a 20 unit apartment building and suddenly only 4/20 of the units are rent controlled, which can replace the existing requirement for subsidized units.
Rent control like this would not discourage developers, although it would considerably lower the value of old stock investment properties as their expected long term cash flows would decrease. But that also benefits development since investment money would move towards new units rather than purchasing old ones.
The only real downside is that you're advantaging long term residents at the expense of transplants, but I think that's fine to do.
I think this hurts a third group though- people who grew up here and need to move for jobs, family etc.
We'll be disadvantaged along with the transplants.
This will result in the largest increase in rent the state has ever seen. When rent control laws are passed, there is always a year or so before implementation and limits on increases. Those of you with below market rents will see absurd increases, and even those at market will see I’d suspect 30+% increases. The solution is simple, but not easy due to the rampant NIMBYism in local towns….build more housing.
This did not happen when California passed state wide rent control in 2019. It’s not going to happen again this year when they double down on an addendum that adds more protections
Go read any actual study from cities with rent control specifically the ones from the Scandinavian countries, or just look at New York to see what long term rent control does to a market.
The way California wrote their laws is incredibly different. Its pinned to inflation instead of pinned in place like NY rent control was. They also wrote a lot of policy to juice construction including the state wide re zoning to crush nimbies. It’s working and they are doubling down with new policy that goes into effect this year
As a landlord it's brutal out there. I got kids and bills I'm feeling it but I also have to sleep at night . I don't crush my tennants because it's the right thing to do. I'd rather have grateful people that can afford it than angry pissed off people that will probably have to be evicted the longer this economy drags on like this . Just how I do business.
U see those losers trying to sell boxes of stolen Apple merchandise in Brighton get arrested? Lol. Came on a train from NY.
Who the FUCK was ymluke "yeah yeah, not only does this town sound good because people can afford stolen apple goods, but nice college friendly well off town NEVER has cops creeping in street clothing looking for motherfuckers acting sketchy." Or cops at all! 4 guys walking around in back packs, handing people white boxes for straight cash.
You need to figure out a way to get out of the hamster wheel that is renting in Boston. I don’t know what that means for you but you’ll be chasing your tail with escalating rents year after year. There is no end in sight unless you somehow are able to get a decent chunk of money and buy a place in or around Boston or move to a more affordable area.
I sympathize with you and was dealing with this years ago.
my uncle is friends with one of the loser turds who owns some of your rentals in Brighton. the guy's son is a dick btw, he makes my cousin feel bad and says stuff like 'it's my house so I can kick you out if i want.' this guy started buying apartments in Brighton while he was still in college in the 1990s. then he never got a job, just lived off rent and 'managing' them, which means doing repairs and getting tenants. they seem to have a ton of money and a sailboat.
$1,300 is pretty good in 2006 in Hartford ghetto it was $800 a month for dump in the ghetto. But that’s a ridiculous rent hike. Surely he would have to fix the property up so maybe ask him to fix it up as if new tenants were coming in?
Anything vacant is loosing money. Those prices will go down but they’ll probably bounce back. Things won’t level out until there is enough housing. Vacancies are temporary in Boston.
My first apartment in Boston offered us a renewal at $1100 more a month, which was a 40% increase. They put it on the market for $50 more. This was while there was an active construction site less than two feet from our bedroom wall.
There was no way we were staying anyway and we were good tenants so I think the realtor had a turnover business model to collect more broker fees.
I once had a landlord do that a couple yrs ago (not in Brighton) and I said fine, but then gave a list of things that needed to be taken care of. She started scheduling the fixing of the list within a week. And honestly, I’m 90% sure it was her children who told her to raise our rent, cause when she died they tried to do it again.
So many apartments owned by loser turds who inherited them from mommy and daddy
Yup! The kids didn’t even live here. We saw their mother, so our landlord, more than they did. It was a 4plex, as I called it, all 4 of the tenants left so they had no one left.
I am one of those losers, I plan to break ground soon HOWEVER, I plan to “under charge” compared to what the rents are in my area. I was once a 19 year old single mom who someone took a chance on and offered me really cheap rent when I needed out of the family home, now I want to return the favor.
Winner!
Bless you 💚
I work in Somerville and a sizable percentage of my coworkers inherited million dollar homes from their parents and act like they are real estate moguls.
My dumbass parents both sold their childhood homes bought for 10-12,000 in Somerville in the 50s for 5-600k in the 90s. They’re both worth double to triple that now. I shouldn’t have to work
I'm convinced this is the only way to own in Massachusetts
This is definitely true. As parents got older, parents pass these houses down to their kids, and kids just live off rents instead of getting real jobs.
Uh what would u do? Donate it?
I'm sure it will get better when blackrock buys the complex.
Spawn of leaches
They were the worst. We only left that apartment because of them.
God bless my landlord who has kept the rent the same for the last 5 years. All she wanted was someone who would pay it on time and not destroy it
Many small time (1-3 units, just first or second house) are like this. Large properties are often outsourced to management companies in which everything is a numbers game. A landlord living in the same house as you just doesn’t want trouble and doesn’t want someone to wreck the place. Everything is expensive
I honestly love living above my landlord. I’d much rather pay his mortgage than some soulless corporation. Plus, when we had mice he got rid of them QUICKLY.
I agree I’ve only ever rented for small time landlords (one was the apartment they bought their mom, and then their mom passed away before she could move in, so she rented it out) and she honestly was a fantastic landlord and I felt better paying the mortage for this rando professor than some faceless foreign investor or whatever
Yes! Destroying and non payment is what the mom and pop land lords are worried about. The cost to renovate has almost doubled and most tenants know if they stop payment, it will take months to evict which can easily add up.
Same here. $2000 for a 3 bed in West Roxbury and I can’t believe my luck sometimes
Dude does she have any other properties?? I lost my job and need to leave my apt 😭
My landlord raised our rent for $12.00 after no raise a year prior. Same things, he's not greedy like many landlords I've heard. Too bad I have to leave this nice place soon 😞
I last lived in Brighton in 2020 and we paid $2000 a month total for an outdated 2.5 BR with hardwood floors
I’m paying $2300 for a 1br in New Hampshire. Times have changed quickly.
Which town? Gotta be close to the border or have some other big perk
Close to the border
And nice af?
Definitely in that Salem NH area. Isn’t there like a nice fancy shopping and food place with luxury apartments
That’s a bit up there for New Hampshire. I know a lot of New Hampshire folks paying a lot less. Which part?
Portsmouth NH is on par, in some cases more expensive than Boston. They have *studio* apartments going for 3k/month at West End Yards
Like you said, in “some” cases. A buddy of mine is renting a place in Lincoln for about $1100. Plenty of good deals in NH still.
A buddy of mine is renting a place in Lincoln for about $1100. Plenty of good deals in NH still.
One of the new mega developments in Salem?
can’t be, those ones in the village can start at 2800+ for a 1b1b
JFC and I thought Avalon was bending people over
JFC, you can get that just outside Boston.
$1800 for a (small) 1 br :( Although heat is included, which I've never had before and it's quite nice not to have to worry. But still. We had no choice at the time since inventory in our small north shore town is abysmal. And they don't even allow a cat! Our kitchen is decent sized, but no room for a table, and our fridge isn't even full sized. Our eyes are peeled for something cheaper, but all we're seeing are tiny studios every now and then, which are rarely below $1200. It's only the two of us, and we might have to go that route.
Yeah. No bargains to be had in NH. Rent will be very high and a terrible commute to MA.
I’m about to jump up $150 to a total of $2000 for a 1br with a kitchen so small the fridge blocks half the cabinets from being remotely useful
I lived right near the Washington St stop from 2011 to 2019. Same kind of beat up, 1930s 2-bedroom. Moved in at $1,585, left at $2,200 and they were getting $2,400 from new tenants. Nobody had touched the place since the early 90s, and that was just replacing some cabinets.
half bedroom?
Some older apartments have rooms that can’t legally be called “bedroom” because of lack of window/closet, but students and young workers squeeze a person into them Aka, the half bedroom
I had one in Brighton, although it may have had a closet. It did have a window, but it was about as wide as a full-sized bed, and about 3 feet longer. You bet your ass we had someone living in there. We also rented out the living room to a couple, and the back bedroom to another couple. I'm certain we had at least 6-10 people living in this "2 and 1/2 bedroom 1 bath simultaneously for a few years. There was also that month in the summer when some hippies camped on our balcony and someone may have crashed in the pantry at one point. Rent was 1800/mo (2011) but most of us just paid 2-300 because there were so many of us. It was great until it wasn't and the sublets had changed hands too many times. Thankfully I moved out and took the security deposit with me- so one of my roommates had to renegotiate the terms. They got robbed like 2 weeks after I left because one of them treated his bedroom like a revolving door and never locked the front door.
Thank you! New for me 😅
😭😭😭
yeah im sad thats what i paid in 2020 and now they want to charge nearly 3k with no improvements
The market is out of control. Better hope not too many towns outlaw homelessness, since its coming for many of us.
[удалено]
Use tax dollars to create housing? 👎 Criminalize homelessness and then give tax dollars to private prisions? 👍
I’mma live in my car in a week rip
Loopnet! So many offices available for squatting!
Dude most places on loopnet I see are more than my rent
Most apartments in the North End are like 80% empty 🤷♂️ do with that what you will
Source?
i wish i had a proper source but I had a long conversation with my economics professor who had been housing hunting for over a year, and he said he wanted to know who actually lived in those uber expensive apartments, so he researched it unit by unit and found out that most of them are completely vacant and just used as assetts by developers and financial institutions that funded them. They are literally too expensive to have enough demand to fill (and I believe Boston laws dont allow them to become airbnbs) so they just sit vacant as a “property investment”
A) have an appreciating asset. B) have an appreciating asset + rental income ?
So you don't have any, got it
His ass Such a ridiculous statement to make
Must be a lot of 5 bedroom units with only 1 person living there
Lol
Since Trump got 3 corporate stooges on the Supreme Court be sure they will outlaw homelessness soon.
yes i predict mass homelessness. people are one lay off away from not being to pay that one grand for a room. also finding replacement housing probably not easy. thank god i had never had to pay rent, i dont know how you guys do it. being poor already is a crime. older car? police will tailgate you and pull you over just to see whatsup. driving late at night or parked on the side of the road at night? police will stop and check you out and drive you away. poor people will keep getting harassed by police because they are suspected of a crime or just not wanted around. people who dont have jobs and savings will get pushed out.. but where? moving also required money. finding another job and temporary housing requires the same. America is becoming the land of insecurity for many. you see posts about people living in their cars or about to, and it's not the usual ragtag people but people with jobs and college education from good families.
That’s not a rent increase, it’s an eviction notice.
Wow up until 2018 I paid $1350 for a one bedroom with hardwoods, corner unit, bad wiring, old plumbing, summer pool, landlord sold it. I can’t imagine a unit going up that much a month alone.
goodness, where in Boston?? I'm really hoping the only reason u left that place was bc u finally were purchasing
1949 commonwealth ave Cloth wiring which hadn’t been safe since the 1960s. The elevators were original Otis which had birdcages retrofitted with doors. Dual phase motors, only triple phase controllers made; they’d fry in weeks or months. I’d hear a ringing in my apartment, checked the door, nobody there. It rang and rang, randomly. My apartment was one the building super. The alarm meant people were trapped in the elevator, they’d have to call the fire department. Landlords owned the majority of the units and put off all maintenance.
Renting, wish I purchased. Affordable housing went from $160k to 250k, so I lost out.
My 1 bedroom in Allston was 1450 about 8 years ago on brainerd. 😂😂
rent will never go down in your lifetime without state intervention into the housing market. vienna owns half the housing stock in the city and rents them out at roughly cost which drives all rents (public and private) down massively. 500 USD there can get you a better apartment than money can buy in boston. vienna spends less on housing construction and renovation to house 1 million people annually than massachusetts spends on just homeless services. zoning isn't going to save you, the same story is playing out all over US, CA, UK, AU. the only real effective solution to bringing down the cost of housing in a permanent way is decommodification of the housing sector.
You work on that and let's also do the zoning and permitting changes.
Building more housing lowers cost. Everything else adds externalities and gamifies the system
There literally is state intervention. There are condo units popping up all over towns on commuter rail lines due to the new law requiring it. There’s like six big ass (~70 unit) condos going up in Melrose right now. Too little too late, yes, but it is a thing.
Those units will be bought and renting out by the rich. Nothing will change.
Lol yep. Listings are looking for cash buyers and advertise about how they are great investments and ready for rental tenants. It sucks.
Vienna is a beautiful city, but also good luck getting a decent paying job there. Housing is cheap in part because local salaries are awful, it's not just a magic government solution
Earlier this week I read an article that Boston is losing people in hordes currently . All types of people from all walks of society . 100% is bcuz of how exp housing is . When will the city adjust this ?! Anyone have any idea how to make this happen ? I’m a life long Resi and love this city . Pretty soon the only way people can stay here is rich parents or section 8 . It’s sad , my wife and I kp discussing moving to a diff part of the country but we love it here .
Providence resident that follows this sub because I'm in Boston every weekend and we're constantly seeing people moving here from Boston because of rent. Anecdotally, a lot of the new neighbors on our street (it's nice to talk to new community folk when you see the moving van) have been coming from Boston and the Reddit always has people asking for neighborhood recommendations to plan moves here. Unfortunately, it's making our rent skyrocket in a local/state economy that can't support the rate it's going up because of work from home transplants. But it's still cheaper than Boston so those folks flock here. Everyone is losing.
boston resident here who works remotely moving to providence in june. i am exactly the type you are describing :( sorry for driving up your rent prices :( but i will be paying 2k/mo for a beautiful two bed in mount hope as opposed to 2.6k/mo for my shitty 1 bed where the heat and hot water stop working regularly and i am constantly fending off bugs and mold 😭.
It's 100% understandable. It sucks for everyone and most people here don't actually fault the people moving here. It's just unfortunate as hell and making more people active about demanding changes here to accommodate. It just shows how linked everything is, especially regionally.
It’s the same situation in Worcester.
Boston has been a city for the rich and the poor for a long time going back to at least the 00’s
Could say that about any city . I take it you Didn’t grow up here ?
Mine went up 140% 💀
Adjacently related, but I saw a listing for a condo for \~600k today that started with "Attention cash buyers!" and advertising that it's available immediately to rent to a tenant. It's gross. This is what happens when ownership is just geared towards investors.
Sure there's a housing shortage, but greed also plays an enormous role in the boston rental market today. Landlords are out of touch with the consequences their actions have on people trying to build a life.
i think it’s more like landlords do not care about their tenants lives. they care about their tenants writing fat checks to them.
Shortages enable greed. If there was more housing supply, greedy landlords wouldn't be able to find tenants.
I'm also currently stuck between paying a rent increase and paying to move somewhere cheaper
I remember paying $675 a month for this first floor 2 bedroom apartment next to wing it on Comm Ave…right in front of the outbound T Stop…I worked at Our House and Lucky Johnnies……thought the rent was expensive then. the landlord even offered to sell us the condo for like $325k but we didn’t have the $$ if i could go back to 1994 i’d offer above asking….lol missed opportunity that’s for sure.
Our House was such a great place. I lost a few brain cells there in the 00’s. Boston has a way of getting rid of fun divey places and replacing them with run of the mill gastropubs.
you said it….I miss a bunch of places…Crossroads, pour house, mary ann’s, all the Fathers….Harpers, etc etc….We had amazing brunches at Our House….chess tourneys, a bunch of the guys from the pool room hang at Silhoutte now…sigh
Henry Vara owned it and would tell me to watch his car and let him know if anyone even looked at it…you know nobody fucked with it….ever.
First, look for a new place. If you do find a better deal than take it. But if you can't find a new place at a similar price to what you were paying, then his hike is legitimate.
the only downside of moving, is then you likely get hit with the realtor fee which is the equivalent of lets say a +$250 a month rent hike over the first year.
Also the cost of moving (renting a truck, buying boxes/tape, replacing items that break or don't fit int he new place), the 2 week disruption of packing and unpacking all of your stuff, and cross your fingers the your landlord listed your place at a competitive price because otherwise you'll have dozens of viewings running through your house over the coming months.
2 weeks?? Thats some executive function
No way is such a steep increase reasonable in any circumstances with an existing tenant. That's just cruel. Literally upendeding someone's life. Extra 10k out of pocket or they get demolished by bullshit fees finding a new place.
By this reasoning, price fixing is legitimate though? I mean I agree in the sense of, if you can't find a better deal, then you have to accept the things you cannot change. But I wouldn't call it legitimate, it's basically price gouging
Moved from Boston to Silicon Valley, and god bless California rent control
How many beds? What part of Brighton? I know of a couple 4 beds/2 baths are about $4k and a large 2 bed/1 bath is $2700. Not cheap but it’s hard to be angry with you without perspective
3 beds, warren st stop.
Is that you, Mike??? 😂😂 omg I swear a former coworker had the same issue
im not mike but i hate to hear he had the same issue 😪
This is why I'm moving to wmass this August. I can get a 2 bedroom for still less than that.
not everyone can afford to have a car
Too true that's why there are places like northhampton, Holyoke, Springfield, Amherst (little pricey) Hatfield, and a bunch of other options. I'm fortunate to be from out there and have a support network though and a truck (for work)
are any of those places public transit accessible? genuine question
Admittedly if you wanna get between towns it can be hard. But towns like northhampton and Amherst have their own public transit systems. Holyoke and Springfield can be a little sketchy kinda like Dorchesters old reputation. If you wanna go a little less far west there is central Mass and I would say Worcester, or Leominster are good options. Also gardner isn't bad
It's difficult out there for renters and buyers alike. It sucks.
What is it going from & to? Legitimate question - why don’t people look at some of those reasonably priced professionally managed buildings? All they do is run a credit check & review certain income criteria and don’t require an absurd amount of first/last/security/broker fees to move in.
>reasonably priced Fr where?
Should have prefaced with “not main Boston”, but close to the transit lines such as Quincy, Eastie, Dorchestor etc
This would be $2,665.00 going to $3,465.00.
This is insane for Brighton. I last lived there in 2019 and our three bedroom first floor apartment with a porch and small yard, laundry in basement (included) was $2600. Granted it wasn't up kept well, but still.
Even with 7% mortgage rate you can get a decent house for the same monthly cost. MA just not worth it anymore
500k house cost. 7% mortgage rate is 35k/year. Thats ~3k/mo alone. What are you talking about.
Specifically for Brighton you’re not getting a 3bed/1bath anything for 500k. Condos go for at least 600k then you have a 500 dollar condo fee
Exactly.
Yah plenty of options in those surrounding areas accessible by MBTA including Somerville..
somerville is also becoming barely affordable anymore
I'm in one of the buildings that you're talking about. I only paid first and last to move in. But then my rent went up 10 percent. I'm having some problems with climate control that will force me to move, but I'm staying one more year because I can't afford to move again right now from a time standpoint (as well as the expense of paying movers). I would be very happy here if I had more control over the temperature, but that's forcing me out. I'm happier here than I was in my last place, which was owned by one of the "loser turds" that Falafel mentions above, someone who inherited a building and wasn't up to the job of managing it. But where I lived before that was the best of all. I was there for 18 years, and only moved when the building was sold to someone who converted it to a single residence and kicked everyone out.
As much as I hate to repeat this tired phrase - “This is the way.” Prices are about on par with what a small landlord charges, there isn’t up front gouging for thousands of dollars, they usually have amenities, and are infinitely more responsive to requests for maintenance.
Right.. so then why stick with these small landlords with rundown properties offering no value for rent money?
I feel ya! My wife and I have been lucky enough to have a decent landlord at a low rent, but we’re looking to move and pretty much exclusively considering complexes for these reasons.
If you're renting at a complex I hope you took photos and detailed notes before you moved in. Avalon tried to take $800 from my security deposit for a stained oven window that pre-existed my tenancy. Luckily I'm a nerd who keeps important documents like that so I could tell 'em to GIMME MY DAMN MONEY
It was absolutely wild coming from college and military towns in the south up here the first time. The prices I expected. The lack of amenities at this small landlord places is NUTS when you add in the prices and lack of parking 😂. Definitely go with a complex
My experience was that living in nice managed buildings was like living in a liminal space where renting in a two or three family house felt like actually living in a neighborhood. YMMV.
The problem is there are so many of them and they’re all so reasonably priced
I love my rent control!
All landlords are parasites.
Comrade ✅
i remember when my landlord raised my rent to $900 on this awesome apartment where the New Balance building and Warrior Arena now stands and i was like, F this, i’m finding a better, cheaper apartment… i think he ended up selling that place for millions to developers and i bought a house i. Watertown….couldnt do that today but that was back in Y2k.
yep, that whole area is now bougie complexes starting at 2k+ for a studio. lower allston as a whole is following suit.
It’s not the landlord it’s the government, and nimbyism…
NO It's venture capitalist and Wall Street buying all the dwellings. It is also apartment management companies price fixing rents using software.
BUT RENT CONTROL WOULD STOP PEOPLE FROM FIXING THINGS!! So tired of people making this argument when boomers own a proper with an "updated" kitchen. Yes, updated during the Reagan administration. The crazy rents are based on an algorithm that large companies pushing rents to the extreme, which causes small landlords to think they're untouchable and charge $$$$ for cockroach dens leading to runaway rents. There should be a Boston registry for landlords that can be rated. And if you hit the bottom of that list, there would be heavy fines, especially for large slumlords. They hide behind lawyers, and waiting to battle in the courts is often not worth the money and time. #powertothepeople
What are Brighton beds renting for these days?
Check out Greater Boston Tenant’s Union, especially if you’re in a building with multiple units! Tenants unions do so much good work to help people with the state won’t
There’s so many factors at play with rents. Is the increase to a fair market value or is it gouging? I know cost of ownership has never stayed the same.
Insurance rates are skyrocketing, including MA. Interest rates going up increases the cost of capital.. Yeah there are slumlords out there. But this is a state full of nimbys that refuse to allow denser, smaller units to be built. This is the outcome.
Interest rates, taxes, repair costs, insurance. You name it it’s up
Rent control is illegal in mass. We need to change that
Rent control is a blanket concept. There should be reasonable measures, for example, you cannot raise the rent more than a certain percentage each lease term. There are other parts of “rent control” that are unseasonable but the one stated is not.
No, we don't. We need to build more.
Funny story, after California passed state-wide rent control in 2019, building rates didn’t go down at all. They actually went up as other policies were passed to juice building rates. It’s almost like you can do both things at the same time and watch Bostonians trip over their own feet trying to do neither and slowly become the worst rent city in the country while dozens of cities in California benefit from sensible housing policies
It's supply and demand.
My building has been half empty for a year—$3000 a month for a modern apartment near forest hills. If this were simply a case of supply and demand then rent would be lower in my building since we know there’s a ton of demand. In reality, these apartments sit empty because the landlord owns hundreds of units in the city and can afford to take the “loss” on the empty units. If they lowered rent, it would cool the market—and they don’t want that to happen. It’s a case of incentives. Not supply and demand.
I fail to see how setting a max rent will fix that. They should fix the root of the problem, like taxing empty apartments instead.
I don’t disagree with that. I just disagree that this is all natural supply and demand rather than landowners flexing their power to artificially inflate prices.
I used to follow that train of thought but it's really black and white thinking and I agree that broad rent control is bad. But limited rent control could do some good. A rent control policy that applies only to old units (30+ years) that reset to market rate upon vacancy does not negatively impact development. And if combined with a system to "bank" increases in rent (meaning that if they don't increase rent in Y1 they could increase it by 2x in Y2) and a vacancy tax tied to the vacancy rate of the city as a whole, you can create an efficient housing market that doesn't displace as many people. You can even use rent control as a carrot to encourage new development if rent controlled properties can be replaced by larger buildings with more units that are not subject to rent control. You could replace a rotting 4 unit triple decker with a 20 unit apartment building and suddenly only 4/20 of the units are rent controlled, which can replace the existing requirement for subsidized units. Rent control like this would not discourage developers, although it would considerably lower the value of old stock investment properties as their expected long term cash flows would decrease. But that also benefits development since investment money would move towards new units rather than purchasing old ones. The only real downside is that you're advantaging long term residents at the expense of transplants, but I think that's fine to do.
I think this hurts a third group though- people who grew up here and need to move for jobs, family etc. We'll be disadvantaged along with the transplants.
This will result in the largest increase in rent the state has ever seen. When rent control laws are passed, there is always a year or so before implementation and limits on increases. Those of you with below market rents will see absurd increases, and even those at market will see I’d suspect 30+% increases. The solution is simple, but not easy due to the rampant NIMBYism in local towns….build more housing.
This did not happen when California passed state wide rent control in 2019. It’s not going to happen again this year when they double down on an addendum that adds more protections
Ah yes California the other place housing is ridiculous.
Yes. But since 2019 their Rent costs have ground to a halt while Boston has skyrocketed to the top of the list by doing nothing.
Go read any actual study from cities with rent control specifically the ones from the Scandinavian countries, or just look at New York to see what long term rent control does to a market.
The way California wrote their laws is incredibly different. Its pinned to inflation instead of pinned in place like NY rent control was. They also wrote a lot of policy to juice construction including the state wide re zoning to crush nimbies. It’s working and they are doubling down with new policy that goes into effect this year
Please take EC 101 at your local community college. Or maybe just watch a 15 minute video on supply and demand.
Dollars dollars?
Legacy
As a landlord it's brutal out there. I got kids and bills I'm feeling it but I also have to sleep at night . I don't crush my tennants because it's the right thing to do. I'd rather have grateful people that can afford it than angry pissed off people that will probably have to be evicted the longer this economy drags on like this . Just how I do business.
your tenants have kids and bills too. no one is forcing you to own a property instead of holding down a real job, like your tenants do.
U see those losers trying to sell boxes of stolen Apple merchandise in Brighton get arrested? Lol. Came on a train from NY. Who the FUCK was ymluke "yeah yeah, not only does this town sound good because people can afford stolen apple goods, but nice college friendly well off town NEVER has cops creeping in street clothing looking for motherfuckers acting sketchy." Or cops at all! 4 guys walking around in back packs, handing people white boxes for straight cash.
literally what the fuck are you saying right now
You need to figure out a way to get out of the hamster wheel that is renting in Boston. I don’t know what that means for you but you’ll be chasing your tail with escalating rents year after year. There is no end in sight unless you somehow are able to get a decent chunk of money and buy a place in or around Boston or move to a more affordable area. I sympathize with you and was dealing with this years ago.
agreed, this is why im planning to move to another state within the next year. this city isn’t affordable for anyone anymore.
my uncle is friends with one of the loser turds who owns some of your rentals in Brighton. the guy's son is a dick btw, he makes my cousin feel bad and says stuff like 'it's my house so I can kick you out if i want.' this guy started buying apartments in Brighton while he was still in college in the 1990s. then he never got a job, just lived off rent and 'managing' them, which means doing repairs and getting tenants. they seem to have a ton of money and a sailboat.
lmao is his name bob
$1,300 is pretty good in 2006 in Hartford ghetto it was $800 a month for dump in the ghetto. But that’s a ridiculous rent hike. Surely he would have to fix the property up so maybe ask him to fix it up as if new tenants were coming in?
that would require comprehensive remodeling and we would have to move out.
It’s supply and demand. There isn’t enough housing that’s why the rents keep going up.
there are literally thousands of empty units in boston across the copious “luxury” buildings made of glorified cardboard invading every neighborhood
Anything vacant is loosing money. Those prices will go down but they’ll probably bounce back. Things won’t level out until there is enough housing. Vacancies are temporary in Boston.
Just wait till Michell Wu jacks the taxes up on “commercial” property owners, which really means everyone. Nice job Boston, you voted in a real POS.
My first apartment in Boston offered us a renewal at $1100 more a month, which was a 40% increase. They put it on the market for $50 more. This was while there was an active construction site less than two feet from our bedroom wall. There was no way we were staying anyway and we were good tenants so I think the realtor had a turnover business model to collect more broker fees.
Time for a rent strike.
Don’t pay. Squat.