Rent Controls

Rent Controls

Below in a copy of the letter we sent to all our legisatures this week. Rent controls will damage the rental industry for as long and the controls are on place.

Dear Congressman,

It has come to my attention that you have a strong resolve to bring new legislation regarding rent controls to the legislature. I understand that the desire for this is to reign in seeming out of control rental rates. However, after 17 years of managing property in the Eugene/Springfield area I can assure you that additional regulations will only exacerbate the situation. 

I have observed over the last two decades as new legislation has passed the relationship between the tenant and the landlord has deteriorated. The time honored business relationship between the landlord and the tenant is strained by each side feeling they are a victim of the other. This induces legislatures to pass more regulations and laws for both sides adding to the already difficult situation. Currently, the atmosphere is war with each side feeling they must secure the next victory in order to stay ahead. The losers are the property managers, landlords and tenants who are just trying to live their life.

In the real world of economics  price is driven in any industry by supply and demand. When the price is high the demand is high and supply is low. When the price goes up this should induce builders and investors to enter the market thereby bringing the supply to market level and bringing prices down again. Additional regulations will have the exact opposite effect. New regulations will only push investors out of the market and thus reduce already strained supplies.

In the end you may be given great accolades for your effort to help tenants, but in all intellectual honesty you will be only hurting them. Please think about your constituents and their families and stop this legislation before it starts.

With warm regards,

James (Ed) Waggoner
Empire Property Management LLC
541-913-8451

Raising Rents

Raising  Rents

Empire Property Management loves to raise the rent. Not that we like hurting struggling families with an additional burden, but we know that in the end it is best for all if we keep the rents at market value. But how is this good for tenants? Well, if the owner keeps the rental rates to low they will inevitable fall behind in the maintenance of the property. When the owner falls behind in the maintenance even tenants who understand the rental market will become unhappy with the arrangement and want the owner to keep the house up. In the end the tenants are unhappy and generally move leaving the owner with a run down house and no money to upgrade. This was a lose/lose for the owners and tenants. Moving is expensive, so the tenants lost. Vacancies and deferred maintenance is expensive, so it is a lose for the owner. Furthermore,expenses are always on the rise, and unless you think your local, state, and federal governments are going to stop their out of control growth we had better keep up with the market. 

We generally raise the rents effective May 1. That way if we get a vacancy over the issue we can often fill it more quickly by hitting the market at its peak. We do not like to raise rents on any tenant that has been in a unit less than a year. If you have a property that is eligible Empire will be contacting you soon.