San José, CA — landlord and rental rules

The Apartment Rent Ordinance limits increases to 5% every 12 months for covered apartments in buildings with three or more units built and occupied before 7 September 1979.

The ARO starts at three units and applies to qualifying apartments built and occupied before 7 September 1979; duplexes, single-family homes, condominiums, townhomes, and newer rentals are outside the local rent ceiling.

Annual cap

5%

Unit counts

3+ units

Construction

Built before 1980

The Tenant Protection Act caps annual rent increases at 5% plus CPI, with a hard ceiling of 10%, on housing built more than 15 years ago.

The 15-year window rolls forward, so a building drifts into coverage with age rather than being fixed by its construction date at purchase.

Annual cap

10%

Construction

Built before 2011

In effect since 2020-01-01.

Costa-Hawkins exempts post-1995 construction and single-family homes and condominiums from *local* rent control, and preserves the landlord's right to reset rent to market on vacancy.

It does not help at the affordable end, because affordable stock is old stock: the buildings a small investor can actually buy are usually the ones Costa-Hawkins does not exempt.

Vacancy decontrol

Yes — rent resets on vacancy

Construction

Built after 1995

San José's Tenant Protection Ordinance requires one of the city's stated causes to terminate covered tenancies in apartment buildings with three or more units, including nonpermitted units and guest houses described by the programme.

The TPO starts at three units; it is broader by building age than the ARO but does not turn a duplex into a covered apartment building.

Unit counts

3+ units

Owners of apartments subject to San José's Apartment Rent Ordinance report tenancy and rent information through the Rent Registry; other three-or-more-unit buildings remain subject to the TPO programme and fee structure.

The Rent Registry monitors ARO apartments; the broader TPO also starts at three units but is not represented here as a claim that every TPO unit has an ARO rent record.

Unit counts

3+ units

FAIR Plan policies are up 139% since 2021, habitability claims are now commonly excluded, and earthquake cover is excluded from every standard policy.

Get a bindable quote before removing contingencies. An insurance assumption carried over from another state is the single largest silent error in a California pro forma.

Fair plan increase since2021

139%