
San Francisco, Silicon Valley rents plunge amid downturn - tarr11
https://www.sfchronicle.com/business/article/San-Francisco-Silicon-Valley-rents-saw-sharp-15307118.php
======
jedberg
This article seems to be based on only a few transactions, as not a lot of
people are actually moving right now.

I manage a couple of properties in the Bay Area, so I keep a close eye on
these things. What I'm seeing is not a drop in rents, but an increase in $0
deposits and many weeks of free rent upon move in (sometimes 6+ weeks).

Landlords are very reluctant to lower rents, because with the statewide rent
control that limits increases to 5% a year, we're incentivized to keep the
rents high and give months of free rent, just so our base rate doesn't drop.

~~~
notyourwork
> Landlords are very reluctant to lower rents, because with the statewide rent
> control that limits increases to 5% a year, we're incentivized to keep the
> rents high and give months of free rent, just so our base rate doesn't drop.

How is it that Mission Bay apartments are not subject to these rent control
regulations if this is state wide? Asking because when I lived in Mission Bay,
UDR properties each year tried increasing my rent much higher than this.

~~~
BigCatStuff
Statewide rent control in California wasn't enacted until January 1, 2020
(with a retroactive period of several months I believe).

So, if you rented before Jan 1, and your rental unit was built after 1979, it
wasn't covered by any rent control. Landlords could raise rent as much as they
wanted on those types of units.

~~~
notyourwork
Thanks for clarifying, I wasn't aware this is a recent change.

------
jcomis
I think the reality will set in soon on this once the CARES bonus UI is
removed (and if it is not replaced) and the PPP loans run out. Right now
everyone I know in real estate is still convinced it was just a minor blip and
love to cite cherry picked stats about how a recovery is already under way.

Coincidently I have been seeing a lot of fully furnished units coming on the
market which I assume were former Airbnbs.

~~~
xur17
> Coincidently I have been seeing a lot of fully furnished units coming on the
> market which I assume were former Airbnbs.

I've been noticing this as well (I can still find some of them on Airbnb
actually).

I'm currently in the market for a house, but wondering if waiting a year might
be a wise move..

~~~
sushisource
If you're staying in the same market and you already own, then it doesn't
matter much. What matters more is that your other investments are relatively
outperforming the house (likely already true because of the Fed's money
printer).

If you don't already own, waiting for a drop might be wise, but if you're
going to sell stock to do it, you might wanna do it now. I'm looking at
trading up to a new place right now and that's my plan.

~~~
jbay808
Doesn't "the Fed's money printer" inflate housing just as much as other
assets?

~~~
orwin
With a lag, and it really depends on the area and how many people benefit from
money printing. If the scheme is QE like in europe, the housing prices will
not gain as much as the market prices in low to middle-class area.

------
schnevets
As a former NYer, I'm hearing stories from friends who got out when offices
closed. Many relocated back to their parent's homes (mostly to suburbs in
Indianapolis, Cleveland, or NJ) or to family vacation homes (in Maine,
Poconos, or Florida).

Selfishly, I hope these friends thrive in these new locales, whether that's
through remote work or finding new opportunities. I hope they get out of their
inflated NYC rents and bring new energy and ideas outside of the city. SF and
NYC have had a chokehold on tech and other prosperous industries for way too
long and this had ramifications nationally and in the cities themselves.

~~~
fullshark
> Selfishly

Not to pick on you cause I agree, but I feel like this is a problem with a lot
of analysis of this phenomenon. A lot of people really really really hope this
happens and the growth of megacities reverses. WFH/Remote job growth is the
mechanism they are counting on because outside the cities there is so little
economic dynamism, outside of a few firms in a few locations that are almost
the only game in town.

At the end of the day, when this is all over, companies are going to want to
have their employees in the office, especially as tech jobs become more and
more commoditized. My guess is in five years you're gonna have superstars that
built insane resumes the past 15 years living wherever they want but the vast
majority of tech jobs will remain in tech hubs.

~~~
schnevets
It's funny you bring up remote work. Despite working from home myself, I
believe remote working as a trend can contribute to displacement and
inequality.

Any job can be enhanced with additional tech literacy, but I don't believe we
will achieve a world where the majority of work is telecommutable. Spending my
salary enriches the local economy a little bit, but I am taking advantage of a
lower cost of living without making much of a major investment. In my current
arrangement, I'm not going to rent office space, hire an intern, work with
local businesses, or do other actions expected of a small business.

In my "selfish" prediction, some of those employees are caught in a dilemma
when lockdown orders are lifted. Spoiled by the potential of life outside of
the megacities, they start businesses in their new locales. And yes, maybe
these small businesses will lease offices, warehouses, or plants locally.
Maybe then we'll see nimble companies competing against the SF/NYC incumbents.

Optimistically speaking, we may even greater diversity in tech, as locals join
the workforce and industries that were suffocated by SF/NYC costs find space
to grow. In particular, I'm always perplexed that agritech, manufacturing,
design, and entertainment feel the need to stay SF or NYC-based.

------
twblalock
If remote work becomes permanent for a lot of people and/or social distancing
lasts a long time, I would expect a number of changes to happen:

\- Homes with more bedrooms will become significantly more attractive because
people will want home offices (maybe one for each spouse!)

\- Homes with outdoor space will become more attractive

\- Quiet homes without noise from neighbors or the surrounding area will
become more attractive

\- Proximity to public transit, freeways, and downtown areas will become less
attractive as the drawbacks will exceed the benefits for most people

All of this will tend to push buyers toward large suburban homes rather than
apartments or condos. In the long term, I expect rents and sale prices for
apartments and condos will drop for those reasons.

House prices might even go up, relatively speaking, compared to prices for
apartments and condos.

What we are seeing right now is not that -- right now, what we are seeing is
people unable to pay rent and landlords desperate for paying tenants.

~~~
jedberg
I'm not sure remote work will drive much of that. Most families were already
moving out of the cities into the suburbs. And young people want to be in the
city for the social aspects and cultural aspects, and proximity to others.

I think what we might see is an increase in demand for bigger units _in the
city_ as a young single person may want a two bedroom place, one for their
home office and one for sleeping, but still want to be in the city to be near
all the cultural and social amenities.

And we'll also see increased demand for even bigger suburban homes as each
spouse needs their own home office.

So I think we'll see increased demand for larger homes in both the city and
the suburbs.

~~~
twblalock
I don't think very many of the social and cultural amenities of big cities
will come back anytime soon.

I think we are in for at least a year of social distancing and heavy
restrictions on restaurants, bars, concert venues, sports arenas, etc. A lot
of things that were previously considered amenities will now seem dangerous,
such as public transit.

~~~
jedberg
In the short term yes. In the long term I think more remote work will stick
around as the amenities return.

------
MAGZine
The rental market is losing it legs in SF for sure, though landlords are going
to try and prop up their values however they can. Like a sibling comment said,
giving free months rather than actually adjusting the rate. The funny thing
is, they price these free months into the rental rate so it looks cheaper than
it is.

Here's some anecdata from my little corner of SF. I know THREE separate homes
trying to fill rooms, and it's going awfully. The rent is too high, and there
aren't enough people looking for rooms.

My old luxury apartment building has cut rents by around $500 for a two
bedroom, about 10% (though I think they're doing it by way of free months).

The luxury building down the street, Duboce, is also offering 2 bedrooms at
about $500 off peak. They're also listing their rooms on craigslist.

I rent a flat with two others in San Francisco. They're both leaving the city,
and rather than find another apartment, I'm going to leave temporarily too.
Funny, the landlord could have just given us a reduction and sign a new lease.
Unfortunately, he'll now have to contest for a dwindling pool of applicants or
let the place sit empty.

------
FreedomToCreate
My community has dropped prices 10% and is offering 1 month free (4 year old
complex in north san jose). However they are not offering this to current
renters whose renewals are coming up. They offered me a 0% increase and when I
cited that the 5 other identical apartments are currently available for
essentially 20% off (10% discount over 12 months plus one month free), they
began been pushing the narrative that the rent will increase by the end of
June and that I should sign now before they change the offer. So now its a
waiting game.

~~~
jedberg
You're actually in a pretty strong position. Normally to leave a lease you
need to give notice, usually 30 days. But there is one time you don't have to
do that -- when the lease ends.

If you lease ends on July 1, you can turn in your keys on June 30 and walk
away. Your landlord knows this.

Rents won't go back up in July. Even if the economy recovers 100% in the next
two weeks, most tech employers in the area are doing WFH until at least the
fall if not next year or forever.

If your lease ends on July 1, start looking for a new place now, but don't
sign anything. As soon as you find something tell your current landlord that
you are about to sign a new lease but you'd much rather not go through the
hassle of moving. If they say yes, great, and if they say no, at least you
have a new place lined up.

Just make sure you take lots of pictures when you move out because your
landlord sounds like the type that will nickel-and-dime you on your deposit.

~~~
pb7
>Normally to leave a lease you need to give notice, usually 30 days. But there
is one time you don't have to do that -- when the lease ends.

Every lease I've ever signed required 30 days notice from either party to end
the lease when the lease term ends, otherwise it proceeds on a month to month
basis with no further action required.

Edit: Technically not required in California but confirmed that it was in fact
required for a previous state I lived in.

~~~
jldugger
This is not really an option in California in my experience. There is no
automatic month-to-month conversion, and it's pretty rare as far as I can
tell.

------
Simulacra
"Rents for a one-bedroom apartment dropped most in the cities richest in high-
paying tech jobs, falling 9.4% in San Francisco compared with May of 2019. In
Mountain View, home to Google, rents fell 15.9% year over year, while in
Apple’s hometown of Cupertino rents dipped 14.3%, according to the rental
search engine Zumper. In San Bruno, where YouTube has its offices, rents
tumbled 14.9%."

~~~
gretch
This really doesn’t match my personal experience at all. I live in Mountain
View (work at G) and pay 2k for a 1 bedroom (non luxury).

Lived here 3 years and pretty happy with it but I checked Craigslist and
padmapper last week for some of these supposed 15% rent discounts and found
rent to be pretty much the same as pre pandemic.

This is anecdata and I’m using human memory to compare rates per
location/amenities but I think I would be noticing even 10% decreases... and
I’m just

~~~
CydeWeys
The 15% drop is in actually signed renewals. The listings you're seeing are
the ones that haven't yet caught up with the new market realities (rents seem
to be somewhat sticky). These listings are aspirational, and aren't being
signed at these levels.

------
ericmcer
This also might open many landlords eyes to how ugly their situations can get
when they want to remove a tenant in Oakland/SF/Berkeley even if a tenant
stops paying rent. I have two friends who are currently refusing to leave in-
law units and it is quickly getting bad for their landlords ($30k deal to get
one of them to leave). That said I totally welcome this, part of the reason
why our communities suck in the bay area is because everyone is renting.
Owners have a vested interest in creating a nice place to live while landlords
and renters have less reasons to care.

~~~
guenthert
In Germany about half the population is renting. That in itself doesn't mean
they're not fostering a community. The difference of course is, that in
Germany there are very stringent renter protections, so tenants do usually
plan to stay for long times (a good share for a lifetime).

~~~
throwaway1777
We have similar pro-tenant protections in the Bay Area to Germany.

~~~
bedhesd
The German housing laws are protective with rent spikes.

~~~
throwaway1777
California now has statewide rent control. San Francisco has had it for years.

------
tanilama
Although I might benefit from this, but I have to point out that this is
supposed to be the intern season, and there were always a surge in rent during
this season in the past.

That is not happening this year. So comparing to last year, you are seeing a
larger drop, but it will left to be seen whether the scale of this drop is
temporary or long-term.

That said, the Bay Area landlords have benefited from the bloom for a decade,
they are losing anything significantly, not yet.

~~~
mistrial9
Bay Area and indeed, California landlords have increased rent at every
opportunity for more than thirty years; multiple studies show that rent in the
1970s was more like ten percent of a working income, that has changed to
thirty percent+ across the entire State of California (on the other hand, San
Francisco itself has always been pricey, at every stage for a hundred+ years).

Isnt it somthing that the last thirty years is exactly when millions of US
adults had turned thirty+. The cost structure of a young adult in the last
thirty years has been nothing like the previous thirty. Building new housing
(and rental units) has been substantially restricted across generations in
California, but it got particularly noxious with the six-figure twenty
somethings taking the rentals, while the other ninety-eight percent of the
population just ate the cost increases at every turn. These are economic facts
and are documented extensively at the Terner Center at UC Berkeley among other
places.

------
DevX101
Looks like people are really leaving the Bay Area. you don't see 10-15% price
drops in a year without corresponding drop in demand.

~~~
xyzzy_plugh
As an anecdote, I left the Bay Area (and California (and the USA)) in January.

Amongst my cohorts/closest friends I know in the Bay Area: \- one moved to
Colorado a year ago. \- another moved to Berkeley from SF, to buy a house. \-
several moved to New York City and Seattle. \- a few moved back to Canada.

In my time in the Bay Area, it always seemed like there was constant
migration: some folks leaving, some folks just arriving. Usually more of the
latter.

Due to the current pandemic, I'd definitely guess that the rate of folks
leaving hasn't changed significantly (compounded with layoffs, etc.) but the
rate of folks arriving certainly has! No interns are flying out, no recent
grads are moving in.

If things "return to normal" then I'd expect this to revert, but those people
aren't just milling about waiting for the gates to open. They're finding other
opportunities, and when the dust settles, the opportunities in the Bay Area
aren't going to be the highly competitive opportunities they once were.

~~~
CydeWeys
Don't underestimate how many extra people are now leaving because they are
working from home for the indefinite future and can get a lot more for their
money (and lower SALT) elsewhere.

I'm in NYC and we are strongly considering moving out when our lease expires
in July. Google NYC isn't reopening at least through the end of the year so it
doesn't make sense to continue paying a lot to live in a one bedroom apartment
that is sub-optimal for multiple people to work from, especially while most of
the typical amenities of city life are closed. The main reason I lived here
was for a short commute and that's irrelevant now.

------
closeparen
Keep in mind this a thinly traded market, during the pandemic even more so.
We're talking about dozens of transactions here.

~~~
pmiller2
At the same time, you have to also keep in mind that apartments in the Bay
Area frequently get rented after a single, 15 minute open house, set at the
convenience of the property owner or leasing agent. This does not seem to be
happening right now, based on how my & my girlfriend’s apartment search has
been going. We’ve also been seeing insane move-in incentives, like 2 months
free rent, which I’ve never seen before. I’d love to see if there was more
data about it, but my experience is leading me to believe the price drops are
real (not statistical aberrations due to a small sample size), and likely
caused by the immense negative demand shock we’ve been experiencing in the
economy at large.

------
burlesona
My office has announced WFH through the end of 2020, with permission to work
from anywhere and no changes to compensation during that time. I would
estimate 1/3 of people have moved out of the Bay Area as a result - many
moving back home to stay with family or friends. Saving 6 months of Bay Area
rent is a big deal.

The folks who haven't moved out of the Bay Area have mostly moved to the
distant exurbs, expecting (probably correctly) that even if we do "return to
the office" in 2021 they'll likely be able to continue to WFH 2-3 days a week,
thus the commute won't be as painful as it would otherwise be.

------
Splendor
> The 9.2% drop in the average one-bedroom San Francisco rent of $3,360 still
> leaves it unaffordable for the vast majority of city residents.

Yeah, that's not much of a drop.

~~~
akhilcacharya
For a 1-bed that's actually $500-700 cheaper than it is in my area (Kendall
Sq. in Cambridge).

~~~
ambicapter
That's absurd, I'm in running distance from Kendall and my rent is <$1k.

~~~
akhilcacharya
....how?

~~~
ambicapter
Roommates, I guess? Also, for clarity, Kendall is 1.7 mi away from me.

------
tinyhouse
I live in the greater Boston area and recently all suburbian homes I've seen
sold for more than the asking price. I'm not following rentals so cannot tell.
I don't think prices gonna drop any time soon. I hope I'm wrong.

Boston has tech but smaller than SF. It's big on pharma, hospitals, and
universities. Such industries cannot switch to fully remote so change here
might not be as drastic as in other places.

~~~
rconti
Houses are still selling for over asking in the Bay Area as well, although I
did see an article saying 2019 prices were down 1.9% over 2018. Rentals are a
different market.

------
onionoaks
Rents IN SF other than downtown actually seem stable or marginally lower
except for downtown and SOMA coz people are running away from downtown due to
homelessness among other issues.

Also colleges are closed so when colleges open in Aug/ Sept, many students
will be back who left this year due to the COVID crisis raising the demand.
This summer the demand is lower than ever due to COVID and homelessness.

------
RcouF1uZ4gsC
I expect in the near future, the urban rents in general will fall. Between
COVID and rioting, living in a dense city just lost a lost of luster.

~~~
safog
You overestimate our cultural attention span :)

Anyway, even with COVID + Rioting, I'd much rather live in a big city than in
the countryside.

~~~
treis
Long term, sure. But there's little point in paying $$$ for a tiny place when
everything is closed due to Covid. Why not decamp for the suburbs/parent's
house for a year and save 20-30k?

~~~
safog
I think this one's definitely happening.

The cost of renewing your lease and staying in the bay area vs simply moving
out for the year to your parents' house / LCOL area where if it really comes
down to it, you can simply break your lease much easier is an easy trade-off.

------
cpascal
Anyone seeing a similar dip in the NYC metropolitan area? I've been casually
watching rents and not seeing much of a dip. It seems that there are less
units available as well, so perhaps that is counterbalancing a decrease in
demand.

~~~
hendzen
Streeteasy data [0] shows a drop in listings but no fall in asking rents.
However there has been a sharp rise in concessions - i.e. free month upon new
lease signing. My guess is landlords are currently keeping apartments off the
market rather lock in lower rents, and when they do need to move a unit they
use concessions since they look better from an accounting basis. I think
eventually we will see a fall in gross rents but it may take longer than
expected.

[0] - [https://streeteasy.com/blog/data-
dashboard](https://streeteasy.com/blog/data-dashboard)

~~~
cpascal
Now that I think about it, you are right about there being more concessions.
You are seeing a lot of "2-3 months free" listings now.

~~~
sethhochberg
Even before the pandemic it felt like 50% of places on Streeteasy had been
listed with net effective rents in recent years... the current situation is
probably just accelerating a trend that was already well underway.

Doesn't mean I'm not kicking myself for signing a 2-year lease on a place last
fall, though. I love my apartment, I've been here 2 years already, and its a
fair price, but I'm basically 8 months into a 24 month lease and could
probably save almost 10k over the next 16 months if I had the option of
breaking the lease and moving.

------
coldcode
About time. When I worked there in the mid-90's I thought it was double what
it was worth. That would be dirt cheap today.

------
jumbopapa
Interesting news. I've heard that real estate prices haven't budged much and
with the stock market remaining relatively strong, I wonder if we will see a
corresponding rebound in rent sometime soon.

~~~
vmception
The demand drivers of students and tech workers is gone, and the street
conditions are abysmal.

The volume of anyone else obsessed with 'networking' is much lower.

~~~
inieves
well said

------
valleyjo
This is happening a bit in Seattle too. I was able to negotiate a _decrease_
in rent after several years of 9% increases. 10% is the max allowed increase
in Seattle if I understand the rules correctly.

------
dmode
Weirdly, I put my place up for rent in South Bay in April and got 10
applications in 5 days without any tours. So there is still underlying demand
in the market

~~~
jedberg
Same. Put up my place in Berkeley on April 28th, had it rented by May 1. Never
rented it out that quickly before, and I had no showings.

------
01100011
I'm curious how much this is driven by foreign students, specifically Chinese,
staying home. On social media I've noticed the meme that China is peaceful and
stable vs the USA which is currently still fighting the virus and plagued by
massive unrest.

I think the lack of interns, tech layoffs, and WFH may be a larger part of it,
I'm just wondering if there is any data out there on how it breaks down by
category.

~~~
usaar333
I would think that international students from China is not only a minimal
amount of the population, but also that very few have even left. (thanks to
China's "five one" airline policy making it very difficult to go back to
China)

~~~
ccktlmazeltov
five one?

~~~
usaar333
one flight per week per country per airline

[https://www.caixinglobal.com/2020-05-28/china-wont-ease-
curb...](https://www.caixinglobal.com/2020-05-28/china-wont-ease-curbs-on-
international-flights-as-fast-as-
expected-101559869.html#:~:text=Dubbed%20the%20Five%2DOne%20policy,more%20than%20once%20a%20week).

It's extremely expensive to fly into China right now because of it.

------
diebeforei485
My landlord in SF offered to lower the rent around 9%.

~~~
robbintt
A corporation or private?

~~~
diebeforei485
Private (individual)

------
robbintt
The SF market is extremely differentiated. The market is still tight in many
verticals and not hugely changed for any landlord not already on the bleeding
edge and pushing higher prices believing them to be reality. The towers are
going to have huge vacancy rates since they practice this price “edge game”
diligently.

------
ThrowAwayBay
My lease in Sunnyvale is ending in 3 months, already last month my landlord
approached me and asked if I want to stay for an extra year at a 5% increase.
I told him I'd like to take some time to think about it and see where things
are headed, but I'll need to get back to him soon. My house is below market
already from looking at Zillow, and even with a 5% increase it still will be,
but I'm not sure what I should do (besides asking nicely to drop the
increase). I'm not sure if/how this will affect big 4-5 bedroom family homes
vs. smaller places. Young single people can just up and leave, for a family
it's less trivial.

~~~
ccktlmazeltov
I've had that happen to me and I told them that I would move if they increase
the price. I really didn't want to move, but I'm also too proud to let someone
up my rent like that. It worked, they didn't increase the rent.

~~~
ThrowAwayBay
Yeah, we're both playing chicken I guess, and they're good landlords and I
think the feeling is mutual; plus they really lucked out to rent to someone
working at a very stable company with low risk of layoffs at the moment. So I
believe I have better leverage at the moment, but if there are two things I
hate, they have to be moving and negotiating.

------
code4tee
Seems to be very localized ups and downs. In the core of cities prices are
crashing and people are trying to get out. Meanwhile in surrounding suburbs
prices are rising and people and getting into bidding wars.

It seems that many want to stay in region but not right in the core of things,
especially if their companies are shifting to WFH where daily commute is less
of a deciding factor.

------
autokad
so far it seems home prices are still high though. however, the data is kind
of unnatural because many are not buying homes right now while many are not
listing homes. I'm very interested to see how home prices in markets like
seattle, nyc, and sf play out over the next year or so.

~~~
proverbialbunny
House prices are down 8-10%. Rent is down 10-14%. ymmv depending on location.

------
ccktlmazeltov
Holy shit! I just checked craigslist and there are a number of super nice
place in SF now for an extremely good price. There's no great place for sale
though.

I'm talking apartments that were above 4k/month which are now around
2-3k/month.

I think this is a good time for me to change flat.

------
onionoaks
Rents have dropped marginally everywhere than than downtown where rents have
dropped drastically coz people are running away from SOMA and downtown.

Rents elsewehere are stable as the demand has gone up from people who are
abandoning downtown for more space and mobility and avoiding homelessness.

------
Snowman66
I was thinking about moving to The Villages in San Jose and purchasing a condo
there. I know that this blog is about rentals, but would someone like to
comment about if I should purchase now or wait and see if there is a price
decline. Thank you in advance.

------
misiti3780
I suspect this is happening in NYC too, but have not seen any data or articles
on it.

------
tkinom
The employers and employees is getting use to work from home.

It is just matter of time for certain percentages (20,30% or more) of folks
decide to move out to Tracy, Sacramento, etc to just commute to work may once
every 1,2 weeks or as needed.

~~~
rconti
There's an entire 1/8th complete housing development at Diablo Grande that
looks like the result of a nuclear holocaust from last time someone thought
people would commute 3 hours for the luxury of living _absolutely nowhere_.

------
itpragmatik
I just rented 2 bed apt in peninsula - absolutely no drop in rent - 1 year
lease is norm (could not find any month-to-month lease) and I was not offered
any free rent for any weeks. Not sure where this plunge is happening!

------
tharne
Between Covid and the current protests/riots, I think we're going to see a
major reversal of the urban renaissance that took place from roughly 1990 to
the present.

A formerly tacky suburban bungalow with a fenced in backyard starts looking
pretty good in a quarantine compared to a one-bedroom apartment where the only
way outside is via a germ-filled elevator. Watching downtowns like Chicago's
burn is going to make a lot of business rethink locating to urban cores,
especially when remote work is proving to be highly effective.

Even if all of this passes quickly, the imagery and emotion will remain. Just
like 3-mile Island effectively put an end to nuclear energy in the U.S. even
though it was an isolated incident, memories of quarantines and burning police
cars are going to do lasting damage to economic development in urban cores.

~~~
redis_mlc
> the imagery and emotion will remain

People have short memories.

> Just like 3-mile Island effectively put an end to nuclear energy in the U.S.
> even though it was an isolated incident

Construction cost killed nuclear.

~~~
tharne
People are already moving out of places like NYC and SF, buying up houses in
the surrounding burbs. It would be nice to believe that people will just
forget this in a few months, but unfortunately that's just not going happen.
You couple that with companies' newfound comfort with remote work, and you're
looking at a long-term slump in investment in urban cores.

------
smattiso
How long until Seattle drops?

------
Paul-ish
So many believe remote work will cause rent to drop. But if we end up in a
situation where you work from home only part of the week, that could actually
spike demand for larger properties.

------
Snowman66
Is the purchase price of a home or condo in San Francisco or the San Jose area
being effected by the rent downturn? Thank you for any comments about that
question.

------
el_don_almighty
You can work from home, but you can't career from home

------
blackrock
Yawn. Wake me up when the rents plunge 50%.

The market there was already excessively over-valued. The virus proved how
unnecessary they actually are.

A real correction is good.

------
TheBlight
Can't read due to paywall but I wonder how much of this is due to most Airbnbs
presumably going empty.

~~~
Splendor
Here's the last sentence of the article: "In addition a lot of Airbnb listings
are being offered as regular apartments now, which could also increase supply
and lower rents, Goss said."

"Goss" is Charley Goss of the San Francisco Apartment Association, FYI.

------
buboard
Time to buy the dip

~~~
arcturus17
rent_price != property_price

~~~
Finnucane
No, but in a more or less normal market, they aren't completely disconnected.
The rent-price ratio will not usually vary a whole lot (one of the markers of
the Great Bubble was that the ratio was completely out of whack). Since units
of housing are somewhat functionally the same whether you rent or buy, price
changes in one part of the market will eventually catch up to the other.

------
paul7986
Never saw allure of living there..sky high rent, smells of a homeless epidemic
like no other I've seen and overall the desire to live in any big city with
COVID and riots/protests is even more unappealing! Hopefully all that and
remote work pushes many to buy in more suburban and rural areas.

~~~
conanbatt
Jobs + weather. Put both of those in the median american value and the city
would become a desert in a year.

