Los Angeles rent statistics show a market shaped by high asking rents, a large rent-burdened population, and a substantial shortage of affordable homes. The Los Angeles Housing Department’s Equitable Rent study reported first-quarter 2024 average effective asking rent estimates of $1,803 to $1,913 per unit, while the Los Angeles City Controller reported that 32% of city renters were severely rent burdened.
Contents
- Current rent levels and market differences
- How rents changed from 2015 to 2024
- Rent burden across Los Angeles households
- Lower-income renters and the affordable housing gap
- RSO and non-RSO rental statistics
- Affordable housing oversight and compliance
Current rent levels and market differences
The Los Angeles Housing Department’s Equitable Rent study, published November 1, 2024, estimated the city’s first-quarter 2024 average effective asking rent per unit at between $1,803 and $1,913. The same study reported that average quarterly rent estimates had reached a range of $2,151 to $2,879 by the fourth quarter of 2023. These figures are estimates for the periods identified in the study, and they describe asking-rent measures rather than a single universal rent paid by every household.
HUD’s Fair Market Rent estimate for a two-bedroom apartment in the Los Angeles metropolitan area was about $2,500 per month, according to the Los Angeles City Controller audit published June 5, 2025. This is a metro-area benchmark, so it is not interchangeable with a city-only average or with the asking-rent estimates reported by the Equitable Rent study.
The City Controller audit also described a luxury apartment example in which 12 of 214 units were designated as affordable. In that same building, the market-rate rent for a one-bedroom unit was more than $3,600 per month. The example illustrates the difference between a restricted affordable allocation and the market-rate units within the same property.
How rents changed from 2015 to 2024
The Equitable Rent study compared asking-rent growth for properties covered by the city’s Rent Stabilization Ordinance with growth at non-RSO properties. From 2015 to 2024, asking rents grew 24.1% for RSO properties and 15.6% for non-RSO properties. The study said that RSO and non-RSO rents increased similarly over time, even though the starting and ending rent levels differed.
CoStar figures in the same Los Angeles Housing Department study provide a separate multi-family comparison through 2023:
| Property group | Average rent per unit in 2015 | Average rent per unit in 2023 |
|---|---|---|
| RSO multi-family properties | $1,396 | $1,732 |
| Non-RSO multi-family properties | $2,314 | $2,676 |
The reported CoStar average for RSO multi-family properties was $1,396 per unit in 2015 and $1,732 in 2023. For non-RSO multi-family properties, the average rose from $2,314 to $2,676 over the same years. These are CoStar averages per unit, while the study’s 2015-to-2024 percentages refer to asking-rent growth, so the measures should be read as related but distinct statistics.
The Equitable Rent study also found that non-RSO renters had average income 22% higher than RSO renters. That income difference provides context for comparing the two property groups: a higher average rent at non-RSO properties coincided with a renter population whose average income was also higher.
Rent burden across Los Angeles households
The Los Angeles City Controller rent burden report, published November 1, 2024, found that 14% of renters in the City of Los Angeles spent at least 90% of their income on rent. The report defined severe rent burden as spending at least 50% of income on housing and found that 32% of city renters met that threshold.
The same report said that one-fifth of Los Angeles renters were in poverty. Rent-burdened households in poverty accounted for 10% of all Los Angeles renters. HUD’s analysis referenced by the City Controller also said that more than half of renters in poverty spent over 90% of their income on rent.
The characteristics of households facing the overwhelming burden were also quantified in the report. Among the group described in the report:
- 93% had household income below $20,000.
- 81% had worked 50 to 52 weeks in the prior year.
- 65% had public health coverage.
- 31% received food stamps.
- 34% lived in one-person households.
- 48% had no children in the household.
These figures show that extreme rent burden was not limited to households without work during the prior year. The report’s 81% figure indicates that most of this group had worked 50 to 52 weeks, while the income and housing-cost relationship still left them with very little available for other expenses.
The Los Angeles Housing Department’s Equitable Rent study separately found that 20% of renters met the federal poverty standard. That percentage is close in scale to the City Controller report’s statement that one-fifth of renters were in poverty, but the reports use different source descriptions and should not be treated as a newly calculated combined estimate.
Lower-income renters and the affordable housing gap
The Los Angeles City Controller audit, published June 5, 2025, reported 1.38 million households in the City of Los Angeles in 2025. More than 568,000 were lower-income renter households, and lower-income renters made up more than 41% of all households in the city.
The city’s Affordable Housing Inventory contained more than 47,000 affordable restricted rental units spread across more than 1,600 properties, according to the audit. The audit described those units as serving more than 568,000 lower-income residents. It also reported that the city would need to add more than 400,000 affordable rentals to address the shortage.
The scale of the gap can be viewed alongside the HUD benchmarks cited in the audit. HUD estimated that 78% of lower-income renters in Los Angeles were cost-burdened. For very low-income or extremely low-income renters, HUD estimated that 87% were struggling with housing affordability. In FY 2023, HUD’s Area Median Income for a four-person household in the Los Angeles metropolitan area was $98,200.
The inventory included more than 300 HOME-funded projects as of 2024 and 12,000 HOME-restricted affordable units. The audit said that affordability restrictions can last up to 55 years, and also described affordability periods ranging from 20 to 55 years. In one land-use agreement example, one of 39 units was required to remain affordable for 30 years. In another project, four regulatory agreements required all 98 residential units to remain income- and rent-restricted for more than 50 years.
RSO and non-RSO rental statistics
Rent Stabilization Ordinance properties and non-RSO properties occupy different positions in the statistics reported by the Los Angeles Housing Department. RSO multi-family properties offered units for approximately $900 less per month than non-RSO multi-family properties, according to the Equitable Rent study published November 1, 2024.
That difference is consistent with the CoStar averages reported in the study. In 2023, the RSO multi-family average was $1,732 per unit, compared with $2,676 for non-RSO multi-family properties. The two averages are separated by $944 per unit in the cited CoStar data. The study also reported that RSO and non-RSO rents increased similarly over time, despite the lower RSO rent level.
The study’s long-term asking-rent figures add another comparison. RSO asking rents grew 24.1% from 2015 to 2024, while non-RSO asking rents grew 15.6%. Those percentages do not establish that every RSO unit became more expensive than every non-RSO unit; they summarize growth for the property groups measured by the study.
Affordable housing oversight and compliance
The City Controller audit reported annual compliance results for affordable housing projects monitored by the Los Angeles Housing Department. In 2021, 1,318 projects were compliant, equal to 73%; 227 were non-compliant, equal to 12%; and 275 were classified as non-submission, equal to 15%.
In 2022, 1,369 projects were compliant, or 69%. The audit reported 281 non-compliant projects, or 14%, and 327 non-submission projects, or 17%. In 2023, 1,346 projects were compliant, or 67%; 264 were non-compliant, or 13%; and 402 were non-submission, or 20%.
LAHD staff said that a noncompliance rate of about 30% was average in their experience. Separately, Urban Futures’ annual monitoring found 179 affordable housing projects classified as noncompliant non-submission between June 2023 and May 2024. LAHD sent follow-up notices to 27 of those 179 projects, or 15%, and only three of the 27 later became compliant. The audit stated that less than 2% of non-submission properties became compliant in FY 2024.
Oversight capacity also affected the monitoring picture. Urban Futures stopped onsite audits in 2020 when the pandemic began, and HUD waived the onsite-audit requirement from April 2020 through December 2021. By the end of February 2025, Urban Futures had completed onsite audits of four projects. The audit also found that Urban Futures had failed to audit 101 of 321 HOME-funded properties during 2017–2019, representing 31% of HOME-funded properties.
LAHD’s HOME inspection group inventory contained 518 HOME-funded rental projects. Between February and May 2024, the group opened between 17 and 42 cases per month, while the monthly average needed to maintain a three-year cycle was 14.4 inspections. The city’s larger Systematic Code Enforcement Program inventory included about 107,000 rental properties subject to inspection. LAHD needed about 2,240 inspections per month to maintain a four-year SCEP cycle but was opening about 1,700 SCEP inspection cases per month in early 2024. LAHD requested and received approval for 15 additional Housing Inspectors for FY 2024–25.
The audit also reported data-management differences: the occupancy-monitoring contractor database contained 353 HOME projects, while Code Enforcement’s HIMS-based inventory contained 518 HOME-funded projects. HIMS itself contained more than 25,000 project records, many unrelated to affordable housing.
Monitoring fees and the rental-unit inventory
LAHD’s land-use monitoring fee was set at $173 per restricted unit per year. Some land-use agreements allowed only $25 per unit per year, others allowed $50, and LAHD found agreements allowing $135 annually per restricted unit. In its 2020 fee study, LAHD charged $135 in annual monitoring fees to 7,730 units. Raising those units to $173 would add $293,740 in annual revenue, an increase described as about 22% of projected annual revenue.
The audit said LAHD charged monitoring fees on about 12,800 affordable units restricted by land-use agreement. Another roughly 34,000 units were restricted by other affordable housing programs and funded through budget allocations instead of monitoring fees. For the broader rental market, the city had more than 800,000 known rental units overall. Together, these figures show why Los Angeles rent statistics include both household affordability measures and the administrative capacity needed to preserve restricted homes.