Beverly Hills rent tumbles drastically as surprising LA County areas spike with huge annual raises

Are they a bit over the Hills?

In the City Of Angels, it’s now even cheaper to rent than buy — especially in the ritzy nabes. LA’s gated Elysium Beverly Hills saw prices for one-room rentals plunge by nearly 9% year over year while rates in more transitional regions surged by as much as 12%, per an eye-opening new survey by Zumper.

The study, titled the Zumper Los Angeles Metro Area Report, analyzed listings active from month to calculate the most and least expensive cities in greater LA, as well as the areas where rents are rising — and falling — the fastest.

The findings point to a cooling trend across Golden State — where the median rent for one-bedrooms was $2,057 per month — with 12 of 27 cities clocking in at less expensive than before.

This downward trend was evident in LA Metro Area, where the lion’s share of markets experienced flat or declining annual rents.

Much of that softness appeared to be concentrated in the region’s priciest neighborhoods.

For instance, costs for single-room rentals in Beverly Hills, where rents cost the second most at $2,750 on average, saw asking rents fall by an average of 4.2% month-over-month — second only to Torrance (4.8%) — and 8.6% year-on-year.

The latter marked the steepest annual decline among neighborhoods where solo-room rentals were $2,000 or higher per month.

The rates for the City Of Dream’s two-bedroom rentals, which set renters back $4,150 per month on average, reportedly dove by 6.1% month-over-month and 12.3% year-over-year.

Other enclaves impacted by the cooldown included West Hollywood (single-bedroom rates declined by 1.5% month-over-month, 5.8% year-over-year), Redondo Beach (2.7% month-over-month, 6.9% year-over-year) and Huntington Beach (5.6% year over year).

Not even Santa Monica, which was the most expensive city at $2,830 for a one bedroom, was safe from this cold plunge. The month-over-month dip clocked in at 2.4%.

The reverse was largely true in SoCal’s lower-end locales.

San Bernardino’s single bedroom rental rates amounted to just $1,470 — the most affordable in the region — but it saw a whopping 5% price increase year-over-year (the two bedrooms saw rents climb 6.4% during this same period).

One-bedrooms in Palmdale, which run renters $1,570 per month, saw the greatest year-on-year price hike at 12.1% (4% month-on-month).

Lancaster, where renters pay $1,480 for a one-bedroom, was the one exception. Although rates rose 5.7% from the previous month, they remained 11.9% lower than a year earlier.

Crystal Chen, a seasoned housing market expert and writer for the Zumper Blog, said these diverging trends boil down to supply and demand.

“In general, new high-end supply coming online in pricier areas like Beverly Hills and West Hollywood gives renters more negotiating leverage, which puts downward pressure on asking rents as landlords compete for a limited pool of top-tier tenants,” she explained. “Lower-end neighborhoods, meanwhile, are seeing price spikes largely because they offer relative affordability.”

She added, “As renters get priced out of city and coastal centers, demand shifts toward these more affordable pockets, pushing prices up there instead.”

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