During the pandemic, rents have continued to rise, as evictions continue to increase nationwide.
According to a report by CoStar News, in 44 of 50 of the largest cities in the U.S., rents have reached record highs. In fact, three cities recorded yearly rent growth of more than 20 percent, according to Realtor.com. On a year-over-year basis, rents marked a 14.6 percent jump in Las Vegas, according to Multi-Housing News.
Nationally, the median rent increased by 8.1 percent year over year, leading to a record high average of $1,575 per month. One reason for this increase is the national housing shortage. Currently, more people are looking at apartments and there are fewer homes on the market, which has been increasing the pricing power for rentals for many landlords.
Despite these increases, Camino Verde Group is striving to create quality affordable housing and to help alleviate homelessness. While rent increases are a necessity for our properties and our investors, we take steps to ensure that our tenants have every opportunity for assistance or aid before starting the eviction process.
Many of Camino Verde Group’s properties in Las Vegas are workforce housing properties. Apartment turnover in these types of properties, even without a rent increase, is normally around 50 percent per year.
To optimize our properties and take care of our tenants, we work to improve vacant units as soon as possible and rent them at market rates. For tenants living in units that have trouble making rent, we utilize our resources to help them get government assistance. As part of our assistance, we require our tenants in need to provide regular updates on their progress. We only begin an eviction process if a tenant shows minimal to no effort in getting available funds to help with rent.
For current tenants, we normally offer a low annual rent increase, which comes out to a 7-10 percent increase. But even with our modest annual rent increases, our tenants still enjoy rates that are below market by 25-30 percent.
For instance, at Camino 2630 in Las Vegas, five units are currently undergoing renovations and seven additional units have tenants who are delinquent in rent and have refused rental assistance. Once evictions are complete, 12 units will be available that will be rented at the market rate, while eight units will see an annual increase of approximately $40 each while still remaining below market rate.
By following these steps, we can accomplish our mission to create quality affordable housing and to help alleviate homelessness.
This allows us to keep our investors happy while still assisting as many tenants as possible who are willing to get assistance when needed.
To learn more about current and upcoming investment opportunities with Camino Verde Group, email me at mike@scotte16.sg-host.com.