Rent Control and Local Rent Ordinances in California

California rent control laws cap most annual rent increases at 5% plus the local change in the Consumer Price Index, or 10%, whichever is lower, and require landlords to have a legally recognized reason to end a tenancy after 12 months of continuous occupancy. These statewide protections come from the Tenant Protection Act (AB 1482), and they sit alongside stricter local ordinances in cities like San Francisco, Los Angeles, Oakland, and Berkeley. Whether a specific unit is covered depends on its age, who owns it, and where it sits.

Which Rentals Are Covered

The Tenant Protection Act, codified at Civil Code Sections 1946.2 and 1947.12, covers most apartments, townhomes, and multi-unit buildings that are at least 15 years old. The 15-year threshold rolls forward each year, so a building finished in 2011 became covered in 2026.¹

Several categories fall outside both the rent cap and the just cause rules:

Units that received a certificate of occupancy within the last 15 years.
Single-family homes and condos, but only if the owner is not a corporation, a real estate investment trust, or an LLC with at least one corporate member, and the tenant has received a specific written notice of the exemption.¹
Deed-restricted affordable housing already subject to an agreement with a government agency.
Dormitories owned and operated by schools or colleges.
Units already covered by a local rent ordinance that limits annual increases below the state formula. In that case, the local rule governs.

The single-family home exemption trips up a lot of people. Without the written notice to the tenant, the exemption does not apply, and the property is treated as covered. Corporate ownership also breaks the exemption. A home owned by an LLC with a corporate member is subject to AB 1482 even though a similar home owned by an individual would not be.

Some units are exempt from just cause eviction protections but still subject to the rent cap. These include owner-occupied duplexes where the owner lives in one of the two units, rooms in an owner-occupied home where the tenant shares a bathroom or kitchen with the owner, and accessory dwelling units.

How Much Rent Can Go Up in a Year

For covered units, a landlord cannot raise rent more than 5% plus the local percentage change in the Consumer Price Index, or 10%, whichever is lower, over any 12-month period.¹ If local CPI runs at 3%, the cap is 8%. If CPI runs at 7%, the cap is 10%, because the formula always picks the lower result.

The cap is measured against the lowest rent charged during the 12 months before the effective date of the increase. Any move-in discount or concession the landlord offered is excluded from that baseline, so a temporary rent break does not lower the starting point for the calculation.

A landlord can split the allowable annual increase into up to two separate increments, but the combined total cannot exceed the cap.¹

When a tenant voluntarily moves out, vacancy decontrol applies. The landlord can reset the initial rent for the new tenant at any amount. The annual cap then resumes from that new starting rent.²

Local ordinances are often stricter. Some cities limit annual increases to a flat 3% or a fraction of CPI, and some allow only one increase per year. Check your city’s rules before assuming the state formula is the ceiling.

Notice a Landlord Must Give Before Raising Rent

California Civil Code Section 827 sets the notice period, and it depends on the size of the increase, measured cumulatively over the prior 12 months.

Increases of 10% or less: at least 30 days’ written notice.³
Increases greater than 10%: at least 90 days’ written notice.³

Because the 10% threshold is cumulative, a second increase in the same 12 months can trigger the longer notice period even if it looks small on its own. A 6% increase three months ago plus a proposed 5% increase now totals more than 10%, so the second one needs 90 days’ notice.

Notice can be delivered personally or by mail. Mail service adds days to the notice period under Code of Civil Procedure Section 1013. A rent increase that fails to meet these procedures is not enforceable, and the tenant can challenge it.⁴

Just Cause Eviction Protections

After a tenant has lived in a covered unit continuously for at least 12 months, the landlord cannot end the tenancy without a legally recognized reason.⁵ The recognized reasons split into two categories.

At-Fault Grounds

At-fault grounds involve something the tenant did. They include nonpayment of rent, violating a material lease term after receiving written notice to fix the problem, creating a nuisance, criminal activity on or near the property, unauthorized subletting, using the unit for an illegal purpose, and refusing lawful entry for inspections or repairs.⁵

No-Fault Grounds

No-fault grounds have nothing to do with the tenant’s behavior. They include the owner or a close family member moving into the unit, withdrawing the unit from the rental market under the Ellis Act, a government order to vacate such as a condemnation, and a substantial renovation that requires the unit to be vacant. Every no-fault termination notice must state the specific legal ground, and a landlord cannot use no-fault grounds as a pretext to replace a tenant.⁵

When additional adult tenants join a lease before the original tenant has been there 24 months, just cause protections apply only if all tenants have been there at least 12 months, or at least one tenant has been there 24 months or more.

Relocation Assistance for No-Fault Evictions

A landlord who ends a tenancy on no-fault grounds under state law must provide relocation assistance equal to one month of rent at the time the notice is served. The payment must be made within 15 calendar days of serving the notice, or the landlord can waive the final month of rent instead of paying directly.⁵

Local ordinances often require more. Cities with their own rent boards typically calculate relocation payments based on how long the tenant has lived there, age, disability status, and household size, with elderly and disabled tenants receiving larger amounts. In San Francisco, Ellis Act relocation payments can exceed $10,000 per tenant and substantially more for qualifying tenants. If a local ordinance applies, the local amount almost always exceeds the state minimum.

How Local Rent Ordinances Fit In

Cities and counties can pass their own rent control ordinances, but the Costa-Hawkins Rental Housing Act draws three lines around what they can do.² Local rent caps cannot apply to any unit that received its certificate of occupancy after February 1, 1995. Single-family homes and condos are exempt from local rent control. And local rules cannot impose vacancy control, so landlords can reset rent to market when a tenant voluntarily moves out.

Within those limits, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Oakland, Berkeley, and other cities maintain ordinances that typically cover buildings older than a local cutoff in the late 1970s or early 1980s. Where a local ordinance sets a lower annual cap than the state formula, the local cap governs. Where the state law is stricter, or where no local rule exists, AB 1482 applies.

Local ordinances often allow one category of increase beyond the annual cap: a capital improvement passthrough. If a landlord installs a new roof, replaces plumbing, or does seismic retrofitting, they can petition the local rent board to pass some of the cost through to tenants as a temporary surcharge. Routine maintenance and repairs do not qualify. Each city’s rent board sets its own rules for what counts, how costs are divided, and how long the surcharge lasts. In San Francisco, costs are spread over 10, 15, or 20 years depending on the improvement, and for buildings with six or more units only 50% of certified costs can be passed through, capped at the greater of $30 or 10% of the tenant’s base rent per year.⁶

Required Disclosure to Tenants

Landlords of covered units must give tenants a written notice explaining that the tenancy is subject to the rent cap and just cause eviction protections.⁷ For leases signed or renewed on or after July 1, 2020, the notice must be a lease addendum or a separate signed document. A landlord who fails to provide the notice may be barred from pursuing a no-fault eviction. Owners claiming the single-family home or condo exemption must deliver the specific statutory notice language. Without it, the exemption is lost and the property is treated as covered.

The 2030 Sunset

Both the rent cap in Civil Code Section 1947.12 and the just cause eviction requirement in Section 1946.2 are set to expire on January 1, 2030.⁸ If the legislature does not renew or replace them, landlords of properties not covered by a local ordinance will have no statewide rent cap and no statewide just cause requirement after that date.

Local ordinances are not affected by the sunset. Long-standing rent control laws in cities like San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Berkeley will continue to operate regardless of what happens to AB 1482. But tenants in cities without a local ordinance, which is most of California, would lose their statewide protections entirely. Track renewal efforts rather than assuming the current rules will roll forward automatically.

1
California Legislative Information. California Civil Code 1947-12
2
City and County of San Francisco. California Civil Code 1954.50 – Costa-Hawkins Rental Housing Act
3
California Legislative Information. California Civil Code 827
4
California Legislative Information. California Civil Code 827
5
California Legislative Information. California Civil Code 1946-2
6
San Francisco (sf.gov). Information About Capital Improvement Petitions
7
Berkeley Rent Board. AB 1482 – The California Tenant Protection Act of 2019
8
California Legislative Information. AB 1482 – Tenant Protection Act of 2019