Biden To Propose Capping Rent Increases At 5%
President Joe Biden plans to announce a new proposal that would cap residential rent hikes nationwide, The Washington Post reported.
The policy, expected to be revealed Tuesday, would disincentivize landlords from raising rents more than 5% per year by removing tax benefits. The proposal would only apply to landlords who own more than 50 units and would not pertain to units that have not yet been built, the Post reported.
White House officials, speaking to the newspaper under the condition of anonymity, said that the cap could provide renters short term relief while new construction comes to the market. In May, the median U.S. asking rent was $1,653, the second consecutive monthly increase and the highest level since October 2022 — though rents had fallen for 11 months prior — according to Redfin.
Biden hinted at the proposal during last week’s NATO conference. At the time, Realtor.com reported that the plan could only apply to affordable units financed through the Low Income Housing Tax Credit program. The Post didn't specify what the tax credit targeted would be.
“It’s time to get things back in order a little bit,” Biden said at the press conference Thursday. “For example, if I’m reelected, we’re going to make sure that rents are capped at 5% increase — corporate rents, for apartments and the like, and homes, are limited to 5%.
Biden also referenced such a plan during his debate with former President Donald Trump in June but didn't specify details of the policy.
Multifamily investors have denounced similar rent regulations, with developers fleeing states that introduce such a policy in favor of more landlord-friendly locales. Some have said that rent regulation only further exacerbates the affordable housing crisis.
"Implying that rent control will solve the nation's housing crisis is the easy way out,” The National Apartment Association said in a statement following Biden’s press conference. “Rent caps, more commonly known as rent control, are failed policies that don't work — research has shown it, the lack of affordability in rent-controlled jurisdictions reinforces it and statements from countless economists across generations and the political spectrum are crystal clear.”
The Housing Solutions Coalition, consisting of the NAA, along with the National Multifamily Housing Council and Mortgage Bankers Association, also denounced Biden’s statements during the press conference.
“He and his policy experts know that the real reason so many Americans struggle with housing costs is because we need to build more housing,” the group said in a statement. “There is no debate. Rent caps hurt renters and communities.”
New York City has one of the strictest sets of rent regulations in the country, including the 2019 Housing Stability and Tenant Protection Act, which drastically limited how much landlords could raise rents on the city's hundreds of thousands of rent-stabilized units. Landlord groups have aggressively battled the legislation, bringing multiple cases to the Supreme Court. So far, the nation's highest court has declined to hear each one.
