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Remember when you use to drive by a house, and it'd have a for rent sign outside that seemed like forever. You would just figure the place was a real dump that nobody wanted to rent. I mean there may actually be places like that still around but given the current state of homelessness and the desperation people find themselves in trying to find a place, any roof is better than no roof I imagine. You can still get some paint and a few cans of Raid if that's what it takes to make it livable.
There was one place a couple blocks from here that had a for rent sign in the window for the better part of the winter before the for-rent sign disappeared. It didn't stay occupied to long as shortly thereafter a vehicle drove buy and sprayed over thirty bullets into it. I'd wager to call that house "iffy" as to its standards but none the less leaving an apartment or house for rent can be very lucrative, more lucrative than actually renting it out.
In my city they say there are sixteen applicants for every place up for rent. Housing is in such a demand that the city even changed all the zoning rules to make it easier for developers and landlords to expand housing. A landlord who has the space can now add on what they call an additional dwelling unit (ADU), set back requirements eliminated, the size of the rooms reduced, and parking are now zoned to encourage landlords to add additional housing to their units. For developers of fewer than six units, parking requirements have been eliminated altogether, the only requirement need for parking now is a developer has to prove there is adequate parking for the residents within one half mile of the dwelling. No, you didn't read that wrong, it was on street parking within three hundred feet. In the one page descriptive of the changes the city said the city is simply getting out of the business of telling the private market how much parking it needs. They go on that when cities don't mandate parking, we make space for people, outdoor dining, protected bicycle lanes, small businesses, housing, street trees, and restaurants creating an amenity-rich, walkable environment. Doesn't matter if those six units can now have up to six unrelated adults living in them, as long as they are thirty-six individuals who will be happy to walk half a mile home each day they can't catch a spot in front of their house.
We've had a few developers come in and build in recent years with quite a few apartments in them. For years driving by them or frequenting businesses around them you often notice that it appears they are not at full vacancy. Like one down the street from me, every time I go near there one side the building is never lit like anybody's living there. There are a couple others that took years to look like the majority of the apartments were rented. You see the same thing on the first floor of these buildings which were all built for first floor retail in mind. They just sit there vacant. I often surmise they are intended for the day that the full implementation of the fifteen-minute city concept comes into full swing. There's really no other explanation why developers would heat, keep the lights on and insure empty space if there wasn't some agenda awaiting at the end of that rainbow. But what about all those empty apartments? What's going on with that? The city is changing up all the rules because there is a lack of places for people to live but there are plenty of apartments that aren't getting rented. What gives?
Well, it's like this. It's more lucrative to let an apartment set than to rent it. Like I said there are sixteen people for each apartment/dwelling that goes up for rent. You want to see if you qualify you have to fill out an application. To fill out an application the average cost to do so is sixty bucks. If you get sixteen people to fill out an application that is nine hundred and sixty dollars. You may think that in that group of sixteen people someone may qualify for an apartment, but if no one does and another sixteen people fill out an application the take is now one thousand nine hundred and twenty bucks. Most would say that they don't keep that amount of money just for taking an application, there are cost involved. Like credit checks, background checks and such. But that may not be the actual truth because in multiple unit buildings, apartments can range in price. The initial thing they'll get caught up in is seeing if you qualify financially for any of their apartments. No use running checks if you can't afford any of the apartments. To afford an apartment they'll tell you that you have to make three times the amount of the rent, but because the rents vary by apartment, they can't tell you if you qualify until you fill out an application. Typically, here a one bedroom will cost nine hundred a month in one of those dwellings, a thousand tops usually. To qualify you have to have an income of three thousand six hundred a month to four thousand dollars a month. A two bedroom can run twelve hundred a month, all the way to fifteen hundred a month. In that situation your monthly income would have to be four thousand eight hundred all the way to six thousand a month. For a large percentage of people that's going to be a big "thanks for the sixty bucks". For any one individual in those sixteen applying who happens to luck out looking at sixteen different places in one month that's nine hundred and sixty dollars you no longer have towards first month's rent and deposit. Now you see how developers can build these multiple unit buildings and be in no hurry to rent them out, they make more money leaving them empty until they can find those rare individuals who fit their monthly financial requirements.
The sad part of the whole jokes on you is that they know within seconds of looking at your application you don't qualify but they tell you to call back in a couple days to see if qualify. That's the number one reason given to someone I know who has been trying to find an apartment. They call back in a couple days to be told they don't make three times the rent. The other day on a social media site for the neighborhood someone was so desperate they posted they were in dire straits living in a van because they couldn't find an apartment, the guy said they were also hampered by the number of applications they could afford to fill out at sixty dollars an application, it would leave them no money for the deposit and apartment.
It sounds like those ads you use to see that were unbelievable claiming you can make thirty thousand a year sitting at home stuffing envelopes. Just imagine if they could get forty, fifty, sixty people a month filling out applications. Really, why mess around with the small stuff if you can make thirty, forty thousand a year on a vacant apartment.