Tenant in Oakland? Your Landlord Probably Can’t Raise Your Rent Much for the Next Year

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For about the next year, many Oakland tenants can’t legally get a large rent increase due to Oakland’s rent control law, which has capped the maximum allowable rent increase to less than 1% for most rent controlled units.

Each August 1, Oakland sets a maximum allowable increase for rent controlled units. This year, the maximum allowable rent increase is .8%. So if your rent is $2,000; your landlord can’t raise it more than $16.

Rent controlled units in Oakland include most rentals built before 1983, but exclude most condos and single family homes. To determine when a housing unit was built, you can contact the Alameda County Assessor’s Office.

For over 20 years, Oakland has set its maximum allowable yearly rent increase by calculating 60% of a years’ inflation rate as measured by the consumer price index, or CPI. In 2022, Oakland passed an ordinance capping rent increases at 3% if the CPI increase exceeds that rate, so the maximum yearly allowable rent increase can never exceed 3%.

Oakland’s maximum allowable rent increase doesn’t apply to units built in 1983 or later, but even if you live in one of these units, state law likely limits the amount your landlord can raise your rent. The Tenant Protection Act, which went into effect in 2020, limits the amount that a landlord can raise a tenant’s rent to 5% plus CPI, or 10%, whichever is less. This year, CPI for the San Francisco Bay Area is 1.3%, so the maximum rent increase would be 6.3%. 

The Tenant Protection Act, however, does not apply to rental units built in the last 15 years. While it does apply to some single family homes and condominiums, these units could be exempt if they are not listed as being owned by a real estate investment trust or a corporation and if the landlord has informed the tenant they are not subject to the law in writing. Oakland rent control laws generally don’t apply to government subsidized housing units, but in some cases, these units are covered by the state’s Tenant Protection Act.

State law requires all California landlords to give their tenants at least 30 days notice in writing if they are increasing their rent 10% or less, and at least 90 days notice if they are increasing their rent more than 10%. For rent controlled units in Oakland, landlords can’t increase rent more than once a year. For units covered under state’s Tenant Protection Act, landlords can increase rent twice, but the total increase can’t exceed the maximum allowable yearly amount.

In some cases, Oakland landlords renting rent controlled units can raise the rent more than the maximum allowable increase. If the landlord does increase beyond the maximum, they have to inform their tenant in writing as to why.

The most common way an Oakland tenant living in a rent controlled building can be charged more than the .8% limit is banking. Banking is a process where a landlord who didn’t increase a tenant’s rent to the maximum allowable amount in any of the previous five years can bank that increase. Essentially, they can calculate how much a tenant’s rent would be if they had charged the maximum allowable increase during those years, and apply that increase to the current year.

But banking a rent increase has strict rules and limitations in Oakland: the new banked increase cannot exceed three times the amount of the current years’ annual allowable rent increase. This means no banked increase in Oakland can exceed 2.4% this year. Additionally, if a landlord purchases a new unit, they can’t bank an increase that the previous landlord did not charge.

There are a few other ways an Oakland landlord can increase the rent higher than the annual allowable limit. These include capital improvement, increased housing service costs, uninsured repair costs, and fair return. In each of these cases though, the landlord must file a petition with Oakland’s rent adjustment program, which is commonly known as the rent board, and get the board’s approval for the increase. Before making any ruling, the board must also inform the tenant of their landlord’s petition and offer them an opportunity to challenge the increase.

If a landlord of a rent-controlled unit raises a tenants’ rent over annual allowable amount for any reason other than banking, they have to include the paperwork from Oakland’s rent board showing the board has allowed the increase.

For units covered under its rent control ordinance, Oakland requires landlords to include notice of the ordinance and information about the city’s rent board. If a tenant thinks their rent increase is in violation of the law, Ethan Silverstein, an Oakland-based tenant lawyer who works with Movement Legal, suggests contacting the rent board, which can guide tenants. Oakland’s rent board is available by phone at 510-238-3721 Monday through Thursday from 9:30 am to 4:30 pm, and by email at RAP@oaklandca.gov.

Silverstein also recommends that tenants talk with their neighbors if they get a suspicious rent increase.

“Talking with your neighbors is absolutely something you should do right away if you’re getting some sort of weird rent increase notice just to see what’s happening in your building and get on the same page,” Silverstein said.

Silverstein said it’s rare that, if a landlord has multiple tenants, just one of them gets a rent increase that violates the law. In general, landlords will charge multiple tenants illegal rent increases at the same time. While approaching a landlord to ask them to charge the legal amount, or taking legal action against a landlord can be effective for individuals, Silverstein says it’s better to do those things as a group.

Silverstein also suggests linking with tenant unions and advocacy groups, like Bay Area Tenant and Neighborhood Councils (Bay Area TANC), Oakland Tenants Union, and The Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment (ACCE) Action.

“We have some of the best tenant laws in the country. The downside of that is it can be tempting to tackle problems on your own,” Silverstein said. “But when a whole building of tenants get together, that can be far more effective.”

A similar version of this story first appeared in The Oakland Post. Thank you to The Oakland Post publishers for permission to reprint.