AVERAGE RENTS of Tenant Households: 1994 ∓mp; 1997
 

Comment The New $700 average rent for tenants who stayed in their decontrolled units was still $200 less than the average market-rate rent in Cambridge, showing that landlords did not gouge tenants when they had the chance. The $925 average tent for new tenants in decontrolled units reflects the fact that most of these units got about $5,000 of new improvements and renovations, after years of neglect under rent control.

Comment The rich moved out, while lower-income tenants remained in their decontrolled units. The tenants who moved in were almost $10,000 a year lower in income than those who moved out.

CHANGING INCOME LEVELS In the Rent-Controlled Housing Stock
 

Comment Because the tenants who moved in were lower income than those who moved out, the average income of tenants in former rent-controlled stock actually dropped by almost $4,000 a year. Decontrol increased diversity.

CHANGING RENT BURDENS of Tenant Households ( rent burden = percent of income spent on rent + utilities )
 

Comment The federal guideline is that a 30% rent burden is “affordable”. After decontrol, the average rent burden across the city was still affordable ö 27%. Rent burdens before decontrol were light for all former rent-controlled tenants, and decontrol did not impose heavy rent burdens on these tenants. New tenants in decontrolled units moved into newly renovated apartments and were willing to spend a little more on rent.The facts reported here are from the city of Cambridge, but the same trends very likely occurred also in neighboring Boston and Brookline

* Inferred by using the study’s data on rent levels and by adjusting income for inflation on the assumption that rent burdens for market-rate tenants did not change.

Comment Some very interesting changes show in this table. A lot of former rent-controlled tenants were single persons living alone. A majority of the tenants who stayed on still are! Those moving in to replace those moving out were less likely to be single. In fact, look at the roommate category. A huge 39% of tenants moving in were roommates compared to only 15% of tenants moving out. The “over-housing” of tenants under rent control ö people living in more space than they really needed because it was so cheap ö has ended, and the number of roommates in the former rent-controlled stock (22%) now equals the number of roommates in the market-rate apartments (23%).

Comment Look at the “post college” category and who’s got the highest number. Consistent with being well-off economically, the tenants who moved out of rent-controlled apartments were also very well educated.

RACE of Tenant Households
 

Comment The “total non-white” category shows a really sad story. Only 12% to 13% of former rent-controlled tenants were minorities. While fully 25% of the tenants moving into decontrolled units were minorities. Note that Asians were very underrepresented among former rent-controlled tenants (2%-3%) and were moving into decontrolled units at a higher rate. After decontrol, the proportion of minorities and of Asians in particular was just reaching the level already existing market-rate housing. Dare we say it; rent control was a “white racist” policy.