I’ve been watching rents in La Jolla and they appear be going down to me. For example, I don’t recall seeing any 2 bedrooms in La Jolla for anything like $1375/month last year:
For those of you in the ‘big box’ places, if you haven’t figured it out, yes, your landlord is going to try and raise your rent every time you renew. Last year, my landlord was going to raise my rent $150/month. I gave notice that I was moving out. Ten days before my lease expired I went back to my landlord and I agreed to renew for just $40/month more. This year, I decided to move into a bigger place and went from paying $1.90/square foot to $1.60/square foot.
You can get a decent deal on rent at the big boxes, but IMO you have to be willing to give notice and be willing to move out if someone rents your place. If someone hasn’t rented your place, you can go back to your landlord and negotiate 1-2 weeks before your lease expires. If you’re not comfortable with the prospect of being 1-2 weeks from homelessness, then it will be tougher to get a good deal on rent because your landlord is going to get more desperate the closer your lease gets to expiring without another prospective tenant. Also, if you decide to move, you will get a better deal on a unit that is currently vacant as opposed to one that is scheduled to be vacant at some point in the future.
I was surprised by the poster above who said that units in UTC are getting snatched up at $100/month increases. It seems like every place I’ve looked at in La Jolla/UTC is offering some kind of special (discounted rent, etc) because they have so many vacancies.
