Maybe don't blow that tax refund quite yet, because if a new real estate report is accurate, you're going to need that extra cash.
The average rent in Los Angeles County will reach $1,416 by 2018, according to the USC Casden Multifamily Forecast. That's a $109 increase from the average price in 2015.
The good news, if you're in a rent-controlled unit, is that your annual 3% rent increase cap should help pad that 8.3% surge. The bad news is you're probably already paying more than that 2018 figure; real estate site Zillow lists the latest median rent for the LA metro area at $2,507.
If we're all going to come to terms with getting priced out of our apartments, then we should at least understand why. But we'll warn you: the explanation isn't very comforting.
Population and employment growth have driven demand faster than the number of new units on the market, according to Raphael Bostic, interim director of the USC Lusk Center for Real Estate. LA County is now home to one fifth of all of California's new jobs, but the housing market just can't keep up. While nearly 18,000 rental building permits were issued last year (the highest number since the recession), they've barely put a dent in the vacancy rate and mostly targeted high-income renters. As Bostic put it, "new construction has simply kept a bad situation from getting drastically worse."
If there's any solace in the LA rental market doom and gloom, it's that we're not alone—our neighbors to the south have it just as bad, if not worse. Rents will increase $149 a month in Orange County and $155 in San Diego County by 2018.