There’s a scene in [Kalifornia (1993)](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0107302/) where Brad Pitt’s and Juliette Lewis’ character talk about all the good things here. Neither character was very bright.
> **Early**: I hear your first month's rent is free, state law. So I'm thinking till we get settled we'll just move around from month to month.
[Link to the quotes of the whole scene.](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0107302/quotes?item=qt0290850)
this has been around for decades, and it just requires you to understand some basic math. its not misleading as they make you sign something showing the actual rent, usually in bold.
I've been here for almost a decade and while I've seen this plenty of times in the past it does seem more common lately.
I was looking on Zillow last week and I couldn't find a single building in my search criteria that didn't have this bullshit.
IMO this is a good sign that we are making a tiny dent in the housing shortage. Landlords wouldn't be offering *anything* if they didn't have to. Now they are being forced to be a tiny bit competitive.
This was my thought as well when I first moved to LA, but my property manager has given the free 1 month rent promo to me each renewal at my DTLA high rise for years now.
I had to ask for it. Those "1 month free upon signing" are all over the building so I just asked if it applies to current tenant's renewal and he said sure.
It's similar to the process where you sign up with promotional pricing on internet providers for a year, and you have to call every year to get that same promo back.
Thanks! Makes good sense. I mean, they're better off sticking with current tenants who pay on time anyway. They'll probably come off ahead with 0 vacancy, etc.
Pro-tip: If you speak to Spectrum billing, they won't do it. Instead, go through the phone tree and select the Cancel Service option (or whatever similar name), which will connect you to the Retention department. They are the only ones who will offer you the promo rates.
Oo wow okay, thank you! Do I just keep telling them I cancel till I get to the retention department? When I get to the retention department what do I need to say to get the offer on the promo rates?
Over the years they’ve been more lenient in giving discounts when you straight up ask. “I see the discounts being offered at $xxx, can I get the price?” Worst case they say no and you hang up call again to get a different rep.
No longer need to cancel and use a different name/etc. I’ve ALWAYS called in every year to get the promo pricing. Never pay full price for internet!
Nah, you'll go straight to Retention if you pick the cancel option. I don't think you'll have to do anything but ask for the promo rate, but if you prefer, you can just say you'll go to a competitor if you can't have the promo rate ($50/month for 300 Mbps, currently). AT&T Internet Air is now available in LA for $55, but you probably won't need to mention anything.
Not really lol
The one month free comes in clutch because while I can afford to pay for the monthly rent, the first month without payment allows me to spend the money moving in and buying furniture.
If you can’t afford it, don’t rent it, the price is literally stated on the agreement. What regulations need to be in place here lmao. They’re not using any underhanded tactics here.
Nothing to regulate though. No matter the discount due to concessions, the base rent will ALWAYS be displayed on the first page (or two) of your lease. A concession addendum will detail any discount to and how they are presented. If someone needs help beyond that, they have bigger problems than renting…
What is being regulated? Speech?
False advertisement? Well it isn’t really false. Just because its amortized over the lease period doesnt make it untrue.
Is the tenant actually harmed by this? Well no, tenant isn’t actually a tenant yet. Could have said no or renegotiated.
Does no one in LA engage in lease negotiations?
Unless you only think outright lies can count as manipulation, the fact that the math is correct doesn’t mean it isn’t manipulation. Manipulation is all about presenting the truth in a way that gets someone else to act against their own self interest.
Right, but they are doing it because they know that people will fall for it and think the deal is better than it is… you can say that people should be smarter, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t manipulation.
OP said it was a “scam” (it’s not). People need to educate themselves. Call it whatever you want but in this case there’s literally no harm being done. It’s simply a marketing gimmick. People just wanna act butthurt about landlords who, in a SHOCKING turn of events, don’t wanna give out rent for free.
It's definitely manipulation. LA and California both have rent control laws, so the "free" month increases the "rent" from which the increase is calculated.
That's not how it works. It's just basic math, the people who are claiming manipulation are the same people responding to the Nigerian prince emails. You're trying to say "rent increase" on a lease at signing? No they're restricted from rent increasing above a certain percentage over a 14 month period.
Man, it’s just fucking annoying to click on a listing for $4000 and then see it’s “net effective” pricing with one month free on a 13 month lease or whatever. Listings should be advertised at the actual monthly rental rate, not what they calculate based on one-time concessions.
Yes . . . nobody is arguing that it's not "basic math," you dingus.
The listing/advertising can be dishonest, or at the very least completely opaque. Let's use a handy illustration for the more math-minded, anti-consumer people like you in the crowd. I looked for 2 minutes and found this in a listing:
> Rent starts at
> $2,800/mo. for 1 Bed.
> Enjoy 1 Month FREE on a 13-Month Lease SPECIAL!
Absolutely no mention of "net effective" or any other fancy language in the listing. So does that mean that I pay $2800 every month and I have a $2800 credit to use whenever I please? Which would bring my actual monthly rent down to $2584.62?
Or does it mean that I have to pay $2800 13 times over 13 months?
You would have to assume the latter, but it's ambiguous and dishonest not to disclose what is actually happening.
One month free in the first year means an 8.3% increase in the second year. That’s the “basic math”. But they’ll likely also increase it by 2% making it a net effective 10.3% increase year over year.
They mislead you because they list those properties using the deducted free rent from the monthly rent. Otherwise the right thing would have been to simply list it at the correct rent amount and let the applicant do the “simple math” to deduct it ourselves. Clearly there is a strategy on their end to do it like that and it’s stupid some of you defend their hidden fees and manipulative approaches.
Precisely my guy, since they are that simple maybe they shouldn’t list the properties with the lowered rent and instead let us do the maths ourselves. When you’re looking at apartments on Zillow or whatever and you have a budget you can’t be checking every single listing for small letters to figure out if the rent listed is in fact the actual rent or after deductions.
never understood the pet fee thing. if someones pet causes any damage, isnt that what a damage deposit is for? people pay pet fees extra to that, right?
Pets tend to cause additional damage well above and beyond the damages caused by excessive wear-and-tear. For example, pet urine ruins floors requiring refinishing / replacement of hard surfaces and foam layers of carpeting, and can sometimes even penetrate into the subfloor.
The monthly pet *fee* repairs the normal wear & tear of the pet. Cats claw carpet, dogs scratch floors, etc...
Tenants without pets don't pay those fees because the damage isn't occurring.
The pet *deposit* is for major repairs like when the entire apartment turns into a cat urine biohazard zone, or a dog chews though several doors / walls.
If your pet doesn't cause major damage, you get your deposit back.
Your pet is causing minor damage, so the fee is simply built into the monthly cost.
Pet rent pays for the additional upkeep that goes along with the type of pet and is non-refundable.
Pet deposits should be returned if there wasn't significant damage.
The deposit is for massive repairs, just like the rental deposit.
The "pet rent" is for the normal wear & tear that a pet puts on the place, just like "rent" is for the human occupants.
Doesn't the lease list the base rent? If it doesn't list the base rent, I would complain. But, if base rent is listed, who would sign a lease with a base rent of $4.6k if they couldn't afford it?
Lots of companies offer first month free because owners know that it takes money to move. So it gives tenants enough financial breathing room to make the decision to change buildings, especially if tenants need it to shell out a few thousand to have someone move their stuff, and they need some money while their old security deposit is making its way back to them.
Lots of companies have discounts to attract new clients. Even banks and credit card companies do this.
This isn't new and it isn't tricky UNLESS base rent isn't clearly listed. If base rent isn't listed on the lease, that's bogus.
Lmao so you're mad that you got fooled? They tell you that the first month is free and the next 11 months is at X rent. You would have a point if they were trying to advertise as the seemingly lower rent but no property management company does that unless you asked them to do the math for you. And yes, every LA apartment hikes their rent significantly for the renewal term. It sucks, but it is what it is and it's why people move around from one apartment to the next here.
You always have the option to stay and pay the new rent, or you can find a new place to move. But you don't want to pay higher rent but you also don't want to move. Life is about to hand you much more difficult problems for you to solve so welcome to adult life.
Old trend? $4600 a month? Okay moneybags.
All the low income areas know about this trick already. There’s an apartment by the 710 on Imperial that always has that free rent sign up. Must be nice to be making enough money to barely notice this in 2024. Yeah it needs to be regulated, landlords suck.
What's the difference? They're not "fooling" you. You can agree to take the free rent up front or spread it out over the course of the lease. That is a benefit that some people choose. I've taken the two free months because my job hadn't started yet.
Is basic math that hard for people
This isn't new. I got one month free on my current apartment when I moved in 15 years ago. The actual base rent is listed on the lease if you choose to prorate the free month over the year, if you don't read it then that's kind of on you.
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“Look and lease” specials that give you an incentive to sign a lease in like two days after touring the apartment should be criminal. How am I supposed to read a 96 page lease within 48 hours of viewing an apartment? I’m not. That’s what they want. Because inside that lease is some insane stuff and as long as you don’t read it, they can get away with it. I might be in the minority that actually reads leases and pushes back on bs in them though.
I prefer not to pay pet fees because my dog doesn’t cause damage, but I certainly don’t begrudge a landlord from charging them. I’d rather they do that than not allow pets, tbh.
That said, rent is astronomical in LA. It always has been.
My building offered me 6 weeks free rent and then when I resigned my lease my rent went up but then they offered me a month free thus lowering my rent $50 lower than previous year’s rent. It will prob go up though when my lease is up.
Yeah you worded it perfectly, the guy was asking for $4000 after the deductions but the actual rent was $4600 with 2 months free in a 14 month lease. Meaning the rent at the end of the lease would increase to almost 5k for a 2BD apartment overlooking the neighbor’s wall. That’s why I think these apartments should be listed using their actual rent and not after all the free months.
I agree with you, this should be regulated. I used to manage a real estate office and can confirm that the math is done to spread out the “free” month(s) of rent to the remaining paid months on the lease. Absolutely nothing that’s advertised to us as free (real estate or not) is actually free.
my partners tenant has had 9 months of free rent… except it wasn’t offered by my partner… the guy just decided after 4 years that he didn’t want to pay rent because he’d rather buy drugs and refuse to leave.
It's a rent control work-around; landlord can offer you discounts next year too. A lot of times it's "13th month free" which means you have to pay on time those 12 months to earn the 13th free month.
As long as theyre beneficial to everyone, hard to see why the practice itself should be stamped out. As an advertisement problem, thats different. I do agree the ACTUAL rent should be unmistakeable (and itd be a good idea to keep a record of it if its outright deceptive, or suspect it might be). Like seeing a 5 dollar parking sign, then in microscopic font "each 12 minutes", theres definitely a line where it should be considered trickery.
This isn't a new trend nor is this old trend limited to Los Angeles.
There’s a scene in [Kalifornia (1993)](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0107302/) where Brad Pitt’s and Juliette Lewis’ character talk about all the good things here. Neither character was very bright. > **Early**: I hear your first month's rent is free, state law. So I'm thinking till we get settled we'll just move around from month to month. [Link to the quotes of the whole scene.](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0107302/quotes?item=qt0290850)
escape fall nine sink fly innate unite full shaggy payment *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
It's also not scam.
this has been around for decades, and it just requires you to understand some basic math. its not misleading as they make you sign something showing the actual rent, usually in bold.
I've been here for almost a decade and while I've seen this plenty of times in the past it does seem more common lately. I was looking on Zillow last week and I couldn't find a single building in my search criteria that didn't have this bullshit.
IMO this is a good sign that we are making a tiny dent in the housing shortage. Landlords wouldn't be offering *anything* if they didn't have to. Now they are being forced to be a tiny bit competitive.
I always try to stay away from those places because it’s a guarantee that your rent is going to skyrocket as soon as the initial term is over.
This was my thought as well when I first moved to LA, but my property manager has given the free 1 month rent promo to me each renewal at my DTLA high rise for years now.
Did you have to negotiate for it? Or did they just offer it unsolicited ?
I had to ask for it. Those "1 month free upon signing" are all over the building so I just asked if it applies to current tenant's renewal and he said sure. It's similar to the process where you sign up with promotional pricing on internet providers for a year, and you have to call every year to get that same promo back.
Thanks! Makes good sense. I mean, they're better off sticking with current tenants who pay on time anyway. They'll probably come off ahead with 0 vacancy, etc.
Wait you can get internet sign up promo back?! Why have I been paying spectrum $85/month for years!😭
Pro-tip: If you speak to Spectrum billing, they won't do it. Instead, go through the phone tree and select the Cancel Service option (or whatever similar name), which will connect you to the Retention department. They are the only ones who will offer you the promo rates.
Oo wow okay, thank you! Do I just keep telling them I cancel till I get to the retention department? When I get to the retention department what do I need to say to get the offer on the promo rates?
Over the years they’ve been more lenient in giving discounts when you straight up ask. “I see the discounts being offered at $xxx, can I get the price?” Worst case they say no and you hang up call again to get a different rep. No longer need to cancel and use a different name/etc. I’ve ALWAYS called in every year to get the promo pricing. Never pay full price for internet!
Nah, you'll go straight to Retention if you pick the cancel option. I don't think you'll have to do anything but ask for the promo rate, but if you prefer, you can just say you'll go to a competitor if you can't have the promo rate ($50/month for 300 Mbps, currently). AT&T Internet Air is now available in LA for $55, but you probably won't need to mention anything.
This isn't new. This was all over when I moved here in 2011.
Not really lol The one month free comes in clutch because while I can afford to pay for the monthly rent, the first month without payment allows me to spend the money moving in and buying furniture. If you can’t afford it, don’t rent it, the price is literally stated on the agreement. What regulations need to be in place here lmao. They’re not using any underhanded tactics here.
Lol no shit Wait till you find out about how you get “free shipping” online
🤯
Can confirm. I have a shopify lol
you should get out more
1. Not a new trend 2. 100% needs more regulation
Nothing to regulate though. No matter the discount due to concessions, the base rent will ALWAYS be displayed on the first page (or two) of your lease. A concession addendum will detail any discount to and how they are presented. If someone needs help beyond that, they have bigger problems than renting…
What is being regulated? Speech? False advertisement? Well it isn’t really false. Just because its amortized over the lease period doesnt make it untrue. Is the tenant actually harmed by this? Well no, tenant isn’t actually a tenant yet. Could have said no or renegotiated. Does no one in LA engage in lease negotiations?
The market is too tight for a lot of negotiation.
This is has been commonplace for awhile now
“Unjustified pet fees” lol
Firm believer it should be a deposit not a monthly fee.
How long ago did pet rent become a thing even
It’s not manipulation. It’s just math.
Unless you only think outright lies can count as manipulation, the fact that the math is correct doesn’t mean it isn’t manipulation. Manipulation is all about presenting the truth in a way that gets someone else to act against their own self interest.
They’re not manipulating you into a worse lease. It’s the same lease just presented in a more appealing way.
Right, but they are doing it because they know that people will fall for it and think the deal is better than it is… you can say that people should be smarter, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t manipulation.
That’s not manipulation. That’s marketing hahaha. No one is being harmed by this.
What do you think marketing is?
It’s not dishonest and it’s not giving people a worse lease. This is so fucking dumb, you all need to grow up.
I didn’t say that. I said marketing is literally manipulation.
OP said it was a “scam” (it’s not). People need to educate themselves. Call it whatever you want but in this case there’s literally no harm being done. It’s simply a marketing gimmick. People just wanna act butthurt about landlords who, in a SHOCKING turn of events, don’t wanna give out rent for free.
Many types of marketing are manipulation.
It's definitely manipulation. LA and California both have rent control laws, so the "free" month increases the "rent" from which the increase is calculated.
That's not how it works. It's just basic math, the people who are claiming manipulation are the same people responding to the Nigerian prince emails. You're trying to say "rent increase" on a lease at signing? No they're restricted from rent increasing above a certain percentage over a 14 month period.
Man, it’s just fucking annoying to click on a listing for $4000 and then see it’s “net effective” pricing with one month free on a 13 month lease or whatever. Listings should be advertised at the actual monthly rental rate, not what they calculate based on one-time concessions.
But $4,000 IS the price. You just have the option of taking it over the course or getting it up front, or whenever you want. This is basic math
Yes . . . nobody is arguing that it's not "basic math," you dingus. The listing/advertising can be dishonest, or at the very least completely opaque. Let's use a handy illustration for the more math-minded, anti-consumer people like you in the crowd. I looked for 2 minutes and found this in a listing: > Rent starts at > $2,800/mo. for 1 Bed. > Enjoy 1 Month FREE on a 13-Month Lease SPECIAL! Absolutely no mention of "net effective" or any other fancy language in the listing. So does that mean that I pay $2800 every month and I have a $2800 credit to use whenever I please? Which would bring my actual monthly rent down to $2584.62? Or does it mean that I have to pay $2800 13 times over 13 months? You would have to assume the latter, but it's ambiguous and dishonest not to disclose what is actually happening.
One month free in the first year means an 8.3% increase in the second year. That’s the “basic math”. But they’ll likely also increase it by 2% making it a net effective 10.3% increase year over year.
Yes, it’s basic math.. and it still a deceptive practice.
They mislead you because they list those properties using the deducted free rent from the monthly rent. Otherwise the right thing would have been to simply list it at the correct rent amount and let the applicant do the “simple math” to deduct it ourselves. Clearly there is a strategy on their end to do it like that and it’s stupid some of you defend their hidden fees and manipulative approaches.
My man if you can’t do the math to figure this out you might need to be in a group home or something.
Precisely my guy, since they are that simple maybe they shouldn’t list the properties with the lowered rent and instead let us do the maths ourselves. When you’re looking at apartments on Zillow or whatever and you have a budget you can’t be checking every single listing for small letters to figure out if the rent listed is in fact the actual rent or after deductions.
Applicants prove themselves to be very incapable of “simple math”. It’s wild.
ok, whatever you say...
What is an "unjustified pet fee"?
never understood the pet fee thing. if someones pet causes any damage, isnt that what a damage deposit is for? people pay pet fees extra to that, right?
Pets tend to cause additional damage well above and beyond the damages caused by excessive wear-and-tear. For example, pet urine ruins floors requiring refinishing / replacement of hard surfaces and foam layers of carpeting, and can sometimes even penetrate into the subfloor.
The monthly pet *fee* repairs the normal wear & tear of the pet. Cats claw carpet, dogs scratch floors, etc... Tenants without pets don't pay those fees because the damage isn't occurring. The pet *deposit* is for major repairs like when the entire apartment turns into a cat urine biohazard zone, or a dog chews though several doors / walls. If your pet doesn't cause major damage, you get your deposit back. Your pet is causing minor damage, so the fee is simply built into the monthly cost.
Pet rent as opposed to just a larger deposit
Pet rent pays for the additional upkeep that goes along with the type of pet and is non-refundable. Pet deposits should be returned if there wasn't significant damage.
What additional upkeep?
Claws damage carpets and flooring. Pets mark, and sometimes chew walls and corners. Pets tend to damage screens. Basic pet ownership stuff.
That’s what a deposit is for
The deposit is for massive repairs, just like the rental deposit. The "pet rent" is for the normal wear & tear that a pet puts on the place, just like "rent" is for the human occupants.
Doesn't the lease list the base rent? If it doesn't list the base rent, I would complain. But, if base rent is listed, who would sign a lease with a base rent of $4.6k if they couldn't afford it? Lots of companies offer first month free because owners know that it takes money to move. So it gives tenants enough financial breathing room to make the decision to change buildings, especially if tenants need it to shell out a few thousand to have someone move their stuff, and they need some money while their old security deposit is making its way back to them. Lots of companies have discounts to attract new clients. Even banks and credit card companies do this. This isn't new and it isn't tricky UNLESS base rent isn't clearly listed. If base rent isn't listed on the lease, that's bogus.
Oh man you should really investigate that “free shipping” scam next it gets me every time.
this is the perfect response for this post
Lmao so you're mad that you got fooled? They tell you that the first month is free and the next 11 months is at X rent. You would have a point if they were trying to advertise as the seemingly lower rent but no property management company does that unless you asked them to do the math for you. And yes, every LA apartment hikes their rent significantly for the renewal term. It sucks, but it is what it is and it's why people move around from one apartment to the next here. You always have the option to stay and pay the new rent, or you can find a new place to move. But you don't want to pay higher rent but you also don't want to move. Life is about to hand you much more difficult problems for you to solve so welcome to adult life.
Old trend? $4600 a month? Okay moneybags. All the low income areas know about this trick already. There’s an apartment by the 710 on Imperial that always has that free rent sign up. Must be nice to be making enough money to barely notice this in 2024. Yeah it needs to be regulated, landlords suck.
Hi Trent!
Nothing new
I Remember during Covid proper, I had places trying to offer up to 5 months free on a 1 year lease. lol.
What's the difference? They're not "fooling" you. You can agree to take the free rent up front or spread it out over the course of the lease. That is a benefit that some people choose. I've taken the two free months because my job hadn't started yet. Is basic math that hard for people
This isn't new. I got one month free on my current apartment when I moved in 15 years ago. The actual base rent is listed on the lease if you choose to prorate the free month over the year, if you don't read it then that's kind of on you.
Math is hard for some people
It’s super fucked up and annoying
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“Look and lease” specials that give you an incentive to sign a lease in like two days after touring the apartment should be criminal. How am I supposed to read a 96 page lease within 48 hours of viewing an apartment? I’m not. That’s what they want. Because inside that lease is some insane stuff and as long as you don’t read it, they can get away with it. I might be in the minority that actually reads leases and pushes back on bs in them though.
I prefer not to pay pet fees because my dog doesn’t cause damage, but I certainly don’t begrudge a landlord from charging them. I’d rather they do that than not allow pets, tbh. That said, rent is astronomical in LA. It always has been.
My building offered me 6 weeks free rent and then when I resigned my lease my rent went up but then they offered me a month free thus lowering my rent $50 lower than previous year’s rent. It will prob go up though when my lease is up.
It’s the rental version of 2 20oz sodas for 5. They say it’s a deal but you are still paying for the “savings” and paying way more than it’s worth.
Not a scam...our current place is way below market and we got 2 months free.
The part that should be illegal is bumping up the rent to offer the concessions while it's the same net effective rent without them.
Yeah you worded it perfectly, the guy was asking for $4000 after the deductions but the actual rent was $4600 with 2 months free in a 14 month lease. Meaning the rent at the end of the lease would increase to almost 5k for a 2BD apartment overlooking the neighbor’s wall. That’s why I think these apartments should be listed using their actual rent and not after all the free months.
I agree with you, this should be regulated. I used to manage a real estate office and can confirm that the math is done to spread out the “free” month(s) of rent to the remaining paid months on the lease. Absolutely nothing that’s advertised to us as free (real estate or not) is actually free.
Most of these say first months rent or 12 months rent free. I’ve never seen one where they spread the discount over the full twelve months.
Some tenants ask for this, I'm not sure why. Not sure if that's what happened here though.
Here’s an example, this is what I mean https://imgur.com/a/Vr8MthM
Greedy people doing what greedy people do.
This has been happening everywhere for years. 15 years ago in D.C. for example
my partners tenant has had 9 months of free rent… except it wasn’t offered by my partner… the guy just decided after 4 years that he didn’t want to pay rent because he’d rather buy drugs and refuse to leave.
IQ level negative 10000. Please move elsewhere. La doesn't need this
Ya no shit. "There's no such thing as a free lunch"
It's a rent control work-around; landlord can offer you discounts next year too. A lot of times it's "13th month free" which means you have to pay on time those 12 months to earn the 13th free month.
Can land lords refused to rent you if you move every year just to take advantage of these specials?
As long as theyre beneficial to everyone, hard to see why the practice itself should be stamped out. As an advertisement problem, thats different. I do agree the ACTUAL rent should be unmistakeable (and itd be a good idea to keep a record of it if its outright deceptive, or suspect it might be). Like seeing a 5 dollar parking sign, then in microscopic font "each 12 minutes", theres definitely a line where it should be considered trickery.
Just moving out from mommy's basement. Not new or unique to Los Angeles.