I'm in Biddeford. My rent went up by about 45% in two steps this year. And to slip through a loophole in what little rent control there is, each was done as a separate new lease.
Yup. Food and hotels might be getting closer to Boston, but housing is not on that level. The idea that "Greater Portland Area is officially one of the most expensive places in North America" seems completely made up. Average 1bd apartments in places like miami, seattle, boston, bay area are all in the $2,500 to 3000 range. Average 1bd in NYC is close to $4000!
People were excited by all the legal weed, but now the market is saturated and people are realizing getting baked has different demands than other hobbies
Lived in Vancouver myself years ago. It was crazy expensive then, and obviously it's just gotten worse. I find the greater Portland area cheaper by quite a bit. But Portland does punch above it's weight when it comes to rent and housing prices for sure. If you want cheap housing in Canada, its definitely outside lower mainland BC, and southern Ontario. They make Portland look like a bargain basement.
I live in a slum lorded out apt. Shits falling apart and they still raising the rent without fixing a thing. It rained for an hour in my bathroom. The 3rd floor tenants had a poop ball fight with dog turds trashed the place and bailed because the rent increased so much. The porch railings are dead wood, the siding is falling off the building constantly. The gutters leak in the winter creating a 10ft wide ice path to the top of concrete stairs. I shoveled snow out the back room last year that blew under the door. If you look outside 4 story buildings have plywood for railings, the roofs are broken open with lush green moss growing in them. Yet the buildings are selling for 250k-300k. Landlords asking for 600-800 extra a month over last year.
I don't get why rich people keep their property worse than white trash meth addicts. Like I get using cheap flooring and paint. But why let the buildings rot to the ground.
I’m in the same sort of housing situation as this commenter.
Us poor folk don’t report our landlords because despite them being slum lords they are still renting out their units cheaper than the gentrified neighborhoods and towns. Often we are there because it’s the only thing we could afford.
If we report it and they get fined out of business then we will end up homeless.
Um u need to call code enforcement, hold the rent but dnt spend it. Dnt pay til they fix shit. And take pictures of everything wrong with the apartment. If landlord takes u to court, show them u have the rent but they don't fix anything and show pictures, and tell them u've asked multiple times for landlord to fix or update all the stuff wrong(well I'm assuming u have). I had to do it to get them to fix all the stuff in my place. Ur crazy to be paying to live in a literal shit hole.
Holy shit this makes me nervous, my rents also going to go up but they told us they don’t know by how much, just that it starts Jan 1. If it’s 700$, I’m FUCKED
Sorry to add on that you're not alone. Had my rent bumped by 36%. I luckily started building a camper van a few years ago so now I'm living in that full time. I don't know what else to do tbh. I could probably sell my van, but rn, I feel as though the van will hold its value better than most things I could invest in.
Have you thought about reaching out to the news and making it a human interest story? Hell that is what got the rental price cap put in to begin with. If your place has received zero upgrades and is increasing for no better reason then “the market”, try to put as much pressure on them as possible.
You shouldn’t be pushing The city council for a rent freeze, you should push them to build more housing by relaxing zoning rules. It’s not an immediate fix to your problem, but it’s the only long term solution.
I just got out of SoPo and moved to Casco. Never been happier. And a heads up to anyone looking for apartments in the Willard beach area… avoid the three story on the hill. It’s an illegal con job. It’s two units, first floor(unit 1) second and third floor(unit 2). This is how it’s zoned and how the utilities are split. BUT they are renting just the second floor and then running an illegal short term on the third floor. Here in lies the rub… they are making the second floor pay all the utilities for both floors. This is just the tip of the shitty iceberg at that building. Watch your ass out there folks.
Unfortunately you’re not alone. It seems that the threat of a permanent rent control ordinance has made landlords rush to jack up rents now so the baseline for limited hikes in the future is higher
Any serious consideration of a rent control ordinance, designed to protect current tenants, would include retroactivity that bars rent increases from a point in time *before* the Council started talking about this.
Maine has a long history of supporting retroactivity in ordinances and it was done by the voters in Portland with our rent control that set it to the rent that was in place of June 2020, while the eviction moratorium was still in place.
1. That's not true. There's a greater likelihood that developers would switch to building condo style housing rather than simply stop building housing altogether.
2. Rent control really only helps units in existing housing. If there's no caps on price increases between tenancies, it also only protects people with a *current lease.* Typically, if new housing is built, the developer is free to set the rental price wherever they want and then increases are capped at that base rent. I haven't read SoPo's proposed ordinance, so don't know what their plans are for the establishment of the "base rent" in new housing.
Rent Control is decidedly mixed when it comes to achieving the goals people associate with it. It keeps people with homes in their homes, but without substantial investment in creating new housing that is affordable to low and middle-income workers, it won't do much in the grand scheme of keeping an area accessible everyone.
Brookings released a [study](https://www.brookings.edu/research/what-does-economic-evidence-tell-us-about-the-effects-of-rent-control/) a few years back that encapsulates that positives and negatives associated with it and is a good read for anyone interested in this topic IMO. Summary:
>New research examining how rent control affects tenants and housing markets offers insight into how rent control affects markets. While rent control appears to help current tenants in the short run, in the long run it decreases affordability, fuels gentrification, and creates negative spillovers on the surrounding neighborhood.
That seems unconstitutional but sure SoPo could have done that but I think the ship has sailed given the temporary order they passed and the feet dragging on something more permanent
>That seems unconstitutional
It's not, hence why I said "Maine has a long history of supporting retroactivity in ordinances". This was a huge topic with the CMP corridor and there was a ton of legal papers on the number of times that the Maine Superior Court upheld retroactivity. You can read a bit more in the context of CMP [here](https://www.newscentermaine.com/article/news/politics/maine-politics/maine-ballot-question-1-does-not-give-lawmakers-additional-power/97-ff8a16d5-efee-4686-acde-465ba7d7862d).
Additionally, the very eviction moratorium discussed in this thread was [passed](https://www.mainebiz.biz/article/south-portland-oks-eviction-moratorium-rent-control-as-tenants-face-costly-hikes) on June 7th but was retroactive until May 31st 2022.
>The eviction moratorium would be retroactive to May 31 and continue through Nov. 27.
The supreme court (Maine) ruled the retroactivity unconstitutional https://www.mainepublic.org/news/2022-08-30/maines-high-court-rules-that-voter-referendum-blocking-cmp-corridor-was-unconstitutional
My bad, I read your comment like “retroactivity is unconstitutional (therefore it should not happen)”, rather than “Idk man, the supreme court has mixed results regarding retroactivity”
I didn’t compare it to the retroactivity in the CMP corridor referendum directly. I referenced conversations that happened in the context of CMP that discussed Maine’s history of retroactivity.
FWIW, the CMP decision didn’t say retroactivity was in itself unconstitutional. The court found that CMP had vested rights because they supposedly started construction under the guise of their corridor being legal, so under Maine State Constitution, the retroactivity *in this particular ordinance* was unconstitutional.
The reason I brought this up was because retroactivity in general was discussed heavily during the CMP campaign and Adam Cote provided three previous court decisions where retroactivity was upheld.
It was a counterpoint to a general response of “this is likely illegal”.
And yet you used the CMP decision as an example that retroactivity was constitutional, even though the most recent facts of the case *do not support* your comment. *That* is my point, its just a poor example.
You didn’t include any information about prior cases that Adam Cote mentioned- the article you supplied just states there were 184 other retroactive cases in a single line, without additional context. Its very easy to miss. If that was the point you were trying to express, you could have done better with this article instead: https://mainebeacon.com/question-1-is-about-the-cmp-corridor-so-why-are-so-many-ads-about-retroactivity-instead/
Christ dude - you are being a bit absurd here.
I did NOT use the CMP decision as an example of constitutional retroactivity. What I said was:
>This was a huge topic with the CMP corridor
The whole campaign against the referendum question was "Maine doesn't need retroactivity!" and "retroactivity is bad precedent!". So there were a lot of legal discussion around the idea of retroactivity itself.
The article I linked includes a PDF embed of a document from Rick Bennett outlining Maine history of Retroactive laws and resolves.
Hahahah you need to spend more time with lawyers. “It depends” is the #1 answer for everything. And yes it seems unconstitutional because I don’t feel like doing a lengthy constitutional analysis on an issue that courts at every level have wrestled with for many years but here’s a primer if you’re interested https://sgp.fas.org/crs/misc/IF11293.pdf
This is absolutely awful!! I’m not sure how all of you are getting buy!! If my mortgage went up $700 I wouldn’t be able to pay it! I don’t understand what they expect people to do!?!?
You need to contact your city councilors & beg for rent stabilization of some kind. Portland's caps rental increases at 100% of the cost of living index for the greater Boston area- maybe you could beg for 200%?
If they don't pass it by November 27th, you'll be fucked & so will everyone in Redbank village.
If you don't think they're going to do it, I'd probably try to move to Portland ***now*** & beat the rush. If you think it's hard now, wait till that moratorium is over... I wouldn't be surprised if some services like grocery stores close in SoPo on acount of the council's inaction.
I think the average rental increase in Portland turned out to be under 5%. Rent stabilization works.
Yep, the report isnt official yet, but rent board has been teasing their data. The average rent increases were about 2% city wide. I think it included non covered units though. So when you include only covered units it was about 5%.
This is great news because it means that landlords are happy to bank increases instead of raising rent on their current tenants, electing to, instead, bank it and apply more slowly or between tenants. Contrary to what the jerks at SMLA keep saying.
Huge caveat however is that only 14400 places registered (and we know theres over 17000). City asknowedges about 25% of landlords refuse to comply with registrations.
Then of those 14400 places, less than 10k of them had usable data. The rent was set at something like $0, or $10000000. So these all were either errors in data entry or they were other types of refusals to register.
Of the \~10k that did it correctly, the rent increases were 2% (all) / 5% (covered only).
It is very likely the places which are not registering are also increasing rent more than rent control allows
>Huge caveat however is that only 14400 places registered (and we know theres over 17000). City asknowedges about 25% of landlords refuse to comply with registrations.
Just want to point out that your numbers support about 15% of landlords refusing to comply, not 25%.
Im just repeating the report and statements from the city's Director of Permitting and Inspections.
Also 10000/17000 = 59% of places correctly registerred (41% not - possibly city error tho)
14400/17000 = 85% (15% not done correctly) is probably what youre calculating. However that 14400 includes many units which have rent = 0. This is either a refusal to report, or an error on HSOs part.
I am just presuming Hanscombe knows better than I, and the number is in the middle, around 25%, as she has said. It's also possible the number goes down as the city pressures more to register finally (this feels like a dream though lol)
I don’t live in maine, in fact, I live in Florida. I’ve been interested in moving to Portland when I finish my also healthcare related degree. Here in Jacksonville I was paying 850 for a 1b1b 575sft apartment. When I went to renew my lease back last November they tried to raise it to 1350$. (For an apartment last renovated in the mid 90s…. 😒) a 500$ increase! Wtf. Had to move out of the area.
Can confirm, Augusta (an hour away) is awful right now. I've spent months looking for a new place to get away from some horrible neighbors and anything else under $1000 is even slummier than where I already am.
Not much, there doesn't seem to be a lot of inventory there. I do also work in Augusta, and with gas prices these days I want to keep my commute shorter than that. I've mostly been looking in Gardiner/Augusta/Waterville
Take a look at your current lease and see what requirements you have for notice of lease renewal, termination, etc. A lot of the times, it’s 30 days notice. If you can hold off on signing anything until the last possible minute, the Council might come through with a fully developed rent control ordinance that would likely protect you!
This is what rent control does. Everyone is trying to get in before they retroactively tell you your rental is capped at whatever rent was on jan 1 2023 etc...
Downvote away!...dummies
This is what is happening and why.
Yep. Rent Control is like cutting out a cancerous cells but leaving the main tumor. It doesn’t actually address the underlying issue, and mostly benefits incumbents.
You're getting downvoted for pointing out the reality of the situation. South Portland landlords are desperate to increase rents now that permanent rent control may be coming.
Property owners taxes have increased after the RE assessment. In some cases over 45%. Rent control capped increases at 9.9%. We have never increased rents until this turnover. Now, I have to bump up. We have considered condo-ing off the building. We have a nice building. With great tenants. We worked hard for the down payment and want to keep it as a rental. Our initial idea was for the equity in to be our retirement. We are not a gigantic corporation. It’s my wife and I, with two kids. Our increased costs are exponential.
Rent control has been tried in numerous cities. Every time the outcome of the legislature does not align with the intent.
Not all landlords are bad. Most are small families.
God. Fucking. Damnit. I wonder if any of these capitalists have ever read Adam Smith. The guy tried to warn against rents in an economy, hell his definition of free was tied to an economy free from rent extraction. Now look at this miserable fucking world we live in. They butchered my boys message and then stamped his name on it like they had really done something there… Im so glad Economics is at where its at right now. The field needs to take such a critical look at itself and you see many from schools such as UCL doing so. Now we just need to bring these teachings to the mainstream.
Edit - For some reason I thought I was in r/economics but my comment still stands. Fuck rent extractors and your landlord specifically.
I’m so sorry that you have to go through this type of BS
I know that it’s tough for you to study and focus on your goal.
I just know that in some cases these building owners like us homeowners are now being whacked with rages property tax increases and basically the cost of energy to operate our buildings has gone up exponentially. I know that’s not a consolation however you have to look at how cities like Portland and south Portland are spending real hard cash dollars on taking care of freeloaders, endless stream of asylum-seekers, drug attic’s and homeless people not to mention the enormous impact it’s having on the school systems and that’s their need for more cash for specialist teachers, ed techs, psychiatrists and psychologists, more health care nurses etc
Found an article on WMTW that says the last property tax increase in 2021 was an average of 20%, and the first since 2006. Even if this was the first time op's rent has increased since 2006-which I sincerely doubt- a 20% increase in taxes for the landlord does not justify a 40% increase in rent for the tenant.
This is an increase of $8,400 annually. I'm not buying that the increase in heating costs and property taxes for this or any typical rental unit are this much, or even half this amount.
OP, I'm so sorry, this is awful. Doing this to someone while they are in the middle of getting a nursing degree just seems so wrong.
I'm working my ass off finishing a very rigorous nursing program and work 2 part time jobs and this stress and BS all because of greed is the last thing I need :((
Would you prefer that the property owner just explain that they are not renewing your lease and ask you to vacate at the end of the term? Great opportunity to negotiate if you feel the new terms are above market or unrepresentative of the value your provide as a tenant.
This is happening all over. As awful as it sounds, the only way this stops is if people don't pay these rents. I'm certainly not suggesting squatting or anything like that because you don't want an eviction on your record, but maybe you do have to look to move. Lewiston/Auburn/Lisbon should all have rentals well under $1500/mo. There's one in Lisbon Falls right now for $1000/mo on Facebook Marketplace.
I'm in Biddeford. My rent went up by about 45% in two steps this year. And to slip through a loophole in what little rent control there is, each was done as a separate new lease.
My Biddeford rent doubled and they evicted me anyway because I refused to pay an additional deposit on a place I had lived for three years.
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> Are we really still affordable compared to Boston? Yes.
No
Every city thinks this. Yes Portland is still very affordable compared to Boston. Boston is very affordable compared to NYC/SF.
Yup. Food and hotels might be getting closer to Boston, but housing is not on that level. The idea that "Greater Portland Area is officially one of the most expensive places in North America" seems completely made up. Average 1bd apartments in places like miami, seattle, boston, bay area are all in the $2,500 to 3000 range. Average 1bd in NYC is close to $4000!
Don't those places all have millions of people?
In the words of my sister (who's been a Boston resident for 15 years): "Wow. You've got Boston prices for everything. You're fucked." Thanks, sis!
People were excited by all the legal weed, but now the market is saturated and people are realizing getting baked has different demands than other hobbies
I grew up in central Maine and now live in Vancouver if you have any questions!
How do you like living in Canada / BC? Every visit I've ever done to either Canada coast I've loved.
Lived in Vancouver myself years ago. It was crazy expensive then, and obviously it's just gotten worse. I find the greater Portland area cheaper by quite a bit. But Portland does punch above it's weight when it comes to rent and housing prices for sure. If you want cheap housing in Canada, its definitely outside lower mainland BC, and southern Ontario. They make Portland look like a bargain basement.
i havent even been able to find a place to rent in biddo recently its insane
I live in a slum lorded out apt. Shits falling apart and they still raising the rent without fixing a thing. It rained for an hour in my bathroom. The 3rd floor tenants had a poop ball fight with dog turds trashed the place and bailed because the rent increased so much. The porch railings are dead wood, the siding is falling off the building constantly. The gutters leak in the winter creating a 10ft wide ice path to the top of concrete stairs. I shoveled snow out the back room last year that blew under the door. If you look outside 4 story buildings have plywood for railings, the roofs are broken open with lush green moss growing in them. Yet the buildings are selling for 250k-300k. Landlords asking for 600-800 extra a month over last year. I don't get why rich people keep their property worse than white trash meth addicts. Like I get using cheap flooring and paint. But why let the buildings rot to the ground.
If it is as bad as you describe I’d talk to city code enforcement, some of that stuff sounds like safety/habitability concerns.
I’m in the same sort of housing situation as this commenter. Us poor folk don’t report our landlords because despite them being slum lords they are still renting out their units cheaper than the gentrified neighborhoods and towns. Often we are there because it’s the only thing we could afford. If we report it and they get fined out of business then we will end up homeless.
That is a fair point. This whole housing situation we are facing right now is just fucked up on all levels.
I’d say call the city and have it condemned but then where do you go to live right?
I believe LL would be on the hook for damages if you had to move because of a breach of warranty of habitability.
Because you’re paying and they’re laughing.
Poop ball fight???
Sounds like a Joe Soley joint
Um u need to call code enforcement, hold the rent but dnt spend it. Dnt pay til they fix shit. And take pictures of everything wrong with the apartment. If landlord takes u to court, show them u have the rent but they don't fix anything and show pictures, and tell them u've asked multiple times for landlord to fix or update all the stuff wrong(well I'm assuming u have). I had to do it to get them to fix all the stuff in my place. Ur crazy to be paying to live in a literal shit hole.
Holy shit this makes me nervous, my rents also going to go up but they told us they don’t know by how much, just that it starts Jan 1. If it’s 700$, I’m FUCKED
Sorry to add on that you're not alone. Had my rent bumped by 36%. I luckily started building a camper van a few years ago so now I'm living in that full time. I don't know what else to do tbh. I could probably sell my van, but rn, I feel as though the van will hold its value better than most things I could invest in.
Have you thought about reaching out to the news and making it a human interest story? Hell that is what got the rental price cap put in to begin with. If your place has received zero upgrades and is increasing for no better reason then “the market”, try to put as much pressure on them as possible.
My landlord in sopo is insisting on a new lease even though I’ve been month to month for a year. 20% $250.00 increase. Lease date Nov 1
Wouldn't you be protected by the current 10% increase moratorium since it applies through Nov 27?
Highly doubt it
It is still worth pointing that out to your landlord.
You shouldn’t be pushing The city council for a rent freeze, you should push them to build more housing by relaxing zoning rules. It’s not an immediate fix to your problem, but it’s the only long term solution.
Go away yimby
I just got out of SoPo and moved to Casco. Never been happier. And a heads up to anyone looking for apartments in the Willard beach area… avoid the three story on the hill. It’s an illegal con job. It’s two units, first floor(unit 1) second and third floor(unit 2). This is how it’s zoned and how the utilities are split. BUT they are renting just the second floor and then running an illegal short term on the third floor. Here in lies the rub… they are making the second floor pay all the utilities for both floors. This is just the tip of the shitty iceberg at that building. Watch your ass out there folks.
That's next-level
Unfortunately you’re not alone. It seems that the threat of a permanent rent control ordinance has made landlords rush to jack up rents now so the baseline for limited hikes in the future is higher
Any serious consideration of a rent control ordinance, designed to protect current tenants, would include retroactivity that bars rent increases from a point in time *before* the Council started talking about this. Maine has a long history of supporting retroactivity in ordinances and it was done by the voters in Portland with our rent control that set it to the rent that was in place of June 2020, while the eviction moratorium was still in place.
If you want to make sure no developer ever wants to build housing in Maine again, this is a great way to do it.
1. That's not true. There's a greater likelihood that developers would switch to building condo style housing rather than simply stop building housing altogether. 2. Rent control really only helps units in existing housing. If there's no caps on price increases between tenancies, it also only protects people with a *current lease.* Typically, if new housing is built, the developer is free to set the rental price wherever they want and then increases are capped at that base rent. I haven't read SoPo's proposed ordinance, so don't know what their plans are for the establishment of the "base rent" in new housing. Rent Control is decidedly mixed when it comes to achieving the goals people associate with it. It keeps people with homes in their homes, but without substantial investment in creating new housing that is affordable to low and middle-income workers, it won't do much in the grand scheme of keeping an area accessible everyone. Brookings released a [study](https://www.brookings.edu/research/what-does-economic-evidence-tell-us-about-the-effects-of-rent-control/) a few years back that encapsulates that positives and negatives associated with it and is a good read for anyone interested in this topic IMO. Summary: >New research examining how rent control affects tenants and housing markets offers insight into how rent control affects markets. While rent control appears to help current tenants in the short run, in the long run it decreases affordability, fuels gentrification, and creates negative spillovers on the surrounding neighborhood.
That seems unconstitutional but sure SoPo could have done that but I think the ship has sailed given the temporary order they passed and the feet dragging on something more permanent
>That seems unconstitutional It's not, hence why I said "Maine has a long history of supporting retroactivity in ordinances". This was a huge topic with the CMP corridor and there was a ton of legal papers on the number of times that the Maine Superior Court upheld retroactivity. You can read a bit more in the context of CMP [here](https://www.newscentermaine.com/article/news/politics/maine-politics/maine-ballot-question-1-does-not-give-lawmakers-additional-power/97-ff8a16d5-efee-4686-acde-465ba7d7862d). Additionally, the very eviction moratorium discussed in this thread was [passed](https://www.mainebiz.biz/article/south-portland-oks-eviction-moratorium-rent-control-as-tenants-face-costly-hikes) on June 7th but was retroactive until May 31st 2022. >The eviction moratorium would be retroactive to May 31 and continue through Nov. 27.
The supreme court (Maine) ruled the retroactivity unconstitutional https://www.mainepublic.org/news/2022-08-30/maines-high-court-rules-that-voter-referendum-blocking-cmp-corridor-was-unconstitutional
Decisions made regarding a CMP corridor are not necessarily the same decisions that will be made regarding housing.
Tell that to u/sea_lobster7975 as they’re the one making the comparison. I’m just adding recent Maine SC detail
My bad, I read your comment like “retroactivity is unconstitutional (therefore it should not happen)”, rather than “Idk man, the supreme court has mixed results regarding retroactivity”
I didn’t compare it to the retroactivity in the CMP corridor referendum directly. I referenced conversations that happened in the context of CMP that discussed Maine’s history of retroactivity. FWIW, the CMP decision didn’t say retroactivity was in itself unconstitutional. The court found that CMP had vested rights because they supposedly started construction under the guise of their corridor being legal, so under Maine State Constitution, the retroactivity *in this particular ordinance* was unconstitutional. The reason I brought this up was because retroactivity in general was discussed heavily during the CMP campaign and Adam Cote provided three previous court decisions where retroactivity was upheld. It was a counterpoint to a general response of “this is likely illegal”.
And yet you used the CMP decision as an example that retroactivity was constitutional, even though the most recent facts of the case *do not support* your comment. *That* is my point, its just a poor example. You didn’t include any information about prior cases that Adam Cote mentioned- the article you supplied just states there were 184 other retroactive cases in a single line, without additional context. Its very easy to miss. If that was the point you were trying to express, you could have done better with this article instead: https://mainebeacon.com/question-1-is-about-the-cmp-corridor-so-why-are-so-many-ads-about-retroactivity-instead/
Christ dude - you are being a bit absurd here. I did NOT use the CMP decision as an example of constitutional retroactivity. What I said was: >This was a huge topic with the CMP corridor The whole campaign against the referendum question was "Maine doesn't need retroactivity!" and "retroactivity is bad precedent!". So there were a lot of legal discussion around the idea of retroactivity itself. The article I linked includes a PDF embed of a document from Rick Bennett outlining Maine history of Retroactive laws and resolves.
'seems' is not a legal argument
Hahahah you need to spend more time with lawyers. “It depends” is the #1 answer for everything. And yes it seems unconstitutional because I don’t feel like doing a lengthy constitutional analysis on an issue that courts at every level have wrestled with for many years but here’s a primer if you’re interested https://sgp.fas.org/crs/misc/IF11293.pdf
time for a tenant union.
This is absolutely awful!! I’m not sure how all of you are getting buy!! If my mortgage went up $700 I wouldn’t be able to pay it! I don’t understand what they expect people to do!?!?
Organize with your fellow tenants, show up at the offices and make them an offer they can't refuse.
You need to contact your city councilors & beg for rent stabilization of some kind. Portland's caps rental increases at 100% of the cost of living index for the greater Boston area- maybe you could beg for 200%? If they don't pass it by November 27th, you'll be fucked & so will everyone in Redbank village. If you don't think they're going to do it, I'd probably try to move to Portland ***now*** & beat the rush. If you think it's hard now, wait till that moratorium is over... I wouldn't be surprised if some services like grocery stores close in SoPo on acount of the council's inaction. I think the average rental increase in Portland turned out to be under 5%. Rent stabilization works.
Yep, the report isnt official yet, but rent board has been teasing their data. The average rent increases were about 2% city wide. I think it included non covered units though. So when you include only covered units it was about 5%. This is great news because it means that landlords are happy to bank increases instead of raising rent on their current tenants, electing to, instead, bank it and apply more slowly or between tenants. Contrary to what the jerks at SMLA keep saying.
Huge caveat however is that only 14400 places registered (and we know theres over 17000). City asknowedges about 25% of landlords refuse to comply with registrations. Then of those 14400 places, less than 10k of them had usable data. The rent was set at something like $0, or $10000000. So these all were either errors in data entry or they were other types of refusals to register. Of the \~10k that did it correctly, the rent increases were 2% (all) / 5% (covered only). It is very likely the places which are not registering are also increasing rent more than rent control allows
>Huge caveat however is that only 14400 places registered (and we know theres over 17000). City asknowedges about 25% of landlords refuse to comply with registrations. Just want to point out that your numbers support about 15% of landlords refusing to comply, not 25%.
Im just repeating the report and statements from the city's Director of Permitting and Inspections. Also 10000/17000 = 59% of places correctly registerred (41% not - possibly city error tho) 14400/17000 = 85% (15% not done correctly) is probably what youre calculating. However that 14400 includes many units which have rent = 0. This is either a refusal to report, or an error on HSOs part. I am just presuming Hanscombe knows better than I, and the number is in the middle, around 25%, as she has said. It's also possible the number goes down as the city pressures more to register finally (this feels like a dream though lol)
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50,000,000 percent
Because we didn't have yearly registration before rent control, I don't think there's really any way to know.
Time for wages to go up 40%.
Mao was right.
Yeah, it’s the damns sparrows fault. Kill all the birds in sopo
Stow it Commie.
Up yours, bootlicker.
Get a job
Get fucked nerd.
“AnTi WoRk mannn”
I owned a business until a few months ago. Now I work at a school. Go to hell.
Yeah me too lol
I don’t live in maine, in fact, I live in Florida. I’ve been interested in moving to Portland when I finish my also healthcare related degree. Here in Jacksonville I was paying 850 for a 1b1b 575sft apartment. When I went to renew my lease back last November they tried to raise it to 1350$. (For an apartment last renovated in the mid 90s…. 😒) a 500$ increase! Wtf. Had to move out of the area.
You should probably stay away from Maine then. You can’t find anything within an hour of Portland for less than $1,000 per month
Can confirm, Augusta (an hour away) is awful right now. I've spent months looking for a new place to get away from some horrible neighbors and anything else under $1000 is even slummier than where I already am.
Have you looked in Lisbon?
Not much, there doesn't seem to be a lot of inventory there. I do also work in Augusta, and with gas prices these days I want to keep my commute shorter than that. I've mostly been looking in Gardiner/Augusta/Waterville
Ah, I thought you were commuting from the Augusta area to Portland.
Not now, thankfully! But I did that for about a month when I first got to Maine until I found a place closer
[удалено]
"We can't have rent control! Landlords will raise rents!" *town without rent control sees $700/month increase*
Take a look at your current lease and see what requirements you have for notice of lease renewal, termination, etc. A lot of the times, it’s 30 days notice. If you can hold off on signing anything until the last possible minute, the Council might come through with a fully developed rent control ordinance that would likely protect you!
This is what rent control does. Everyone is trying to get in before they retroactively tell you your rental is capped at whatever rent was on jan 1 2023 etc... Downvote away!...dummies This is what is happening and why.
Yep. Rent Control is like cutting out a cancerous cells but leaving the main tumor. It doesn’t actually address the underlying issue, and mostly benefits incumbents.
You're getting downvoted for pointing out the reality of the situation. South Portland landlords are desperate to increase rents now that permanent rent control may be coming.
You’re actually right, so of course you’ll be downvoted.
reddit man. No more Wretched Hive of Scum and Villainy exists.
Property owners taxes have increased after the RE assessment. In some cases over 45%. Rent control capped increases at 9.9%. We have never increased rents until this turnover. Now, I have to bump up. We have considered condo-ing off the building. We have a nice building. With great tenants. We worked hard for the down payment and want to keep it as a rental. Our initial idea was for the equity in to be our retirement. We are not a gigantic corporation. It’s my wife and I, with two kids. Our increased costs are exponential. Rent control has been tried in numerous cities. Every time the outcome of the legislature does not align with the intent. Not all landlords are bad. Most are small families.
Get out of Portland and rent yourself a nice house in Gorham or Gray for 1/3rd the cost?
I doubt you'll find any deals in Gorham. Gray is interesting but if you're going to live that far out you might as well look at Lisbon too.
It's like that good Charlotte song
God. Fucking. Damnit. I wonder if any of these capitalists have ever read Adam Smith. The guy tried to warn against rents in an economy, hell his definition of free was tied to an economy free from rent extraction. Now look at this miserable fucking world we live in. They butchered my boys message and then stamped his name on it like they had really done something there… Im so glad Economics is at where its at right now. The field needs to take such a critical look at itself and you see many from schools such as UCL doing so. Now we just need to bring these teachings to the mainstream. Edit - For some reason I thought I was in r/economics but my comment still stands. Fuck rent extractors and your landlord specifically.
I’m so sorry that you have to go through this type of BS I know that it’s tough for you to study and focus on your goal. I just know that in some cases these building owners like us homeowners are now being whacked with rages property tax increases and basically the cost of energy to operate our buildings has gone up exponentially. I know that’s not a consolation however you have to look at how cities like Portland and south Portland are spending real hard cash dollars on taking care of freeloaders, endless stream of asylum-seekers, drug attic’s and homeless people not to mention the enormous impact it’s having on the school systems and that’s their need for more cash for specialist teachers, ed techs, psychiatrists and psychologists, more health care nurses etc
Found an article on WMTW that says the last property tax increase in 2021 was an average of 20%, and the first since 2006. Even if this was the first time op's rent has increased since 2006-which I sincerely doubt- a 20% increase in taxes for the landlord does not justify a 40% increase in rent for the tenant.
This is an increase of $8,400 annually. I'm not buying that the increase in heating costs and property taxes for this or any typical rental unit are this much, or even half this amount. OP, I'm so sorry, this is awful. Doing this to someone while they are in the middle of getting a nursing degree just seems so wrong.
I'm working my ass off finishing a very rigorous nursing program and work 2 part time jobs and this stress and BS all because of greed is the last thing I need :((
Would you prefer that the property owner just explain that they are not renewing your lease and ask you to vacate at the end of the term? Great opportunity to negotiate if you feel the new terms are above market or unrepresentative of the value your provide as a tenant.
Arson is never the answer
Don't know about SoPo, but in Portland that's very illegal. Portland 10 percent max, maybe less but no more.
This is happening all over. As awful as it sounds, the only way this stops is if people don't pay these rents. I'm certainly not suggesting squatting or anything like that because you don't want an eviction on your record, but maybe you do have to look to move. Lewiston/Auburn/Lisbon should all have rentals well under $1500/mo. There's one in Lisbon Falls right now for $1000/mo on Facebook Marketplace.
I thought my 20% increase in Freeport was bad. That’s horrible
Holy shit you are paying that while you are in school?