166 Apartments for rent in Long Beach, CA
📍Long Beach is a coastal city in southern California, located twenty miles south of downtown Los Angeles, and west of Anaheim. The city is home to America’s second-largest LGBTQ community and is known for being very LGBTQ-friendly, so you can count on the fact that the city has a kickin’ arts scene, great food and some awesome clothing. On the flip side, Long Beach is also located near Compton. Luckily, we’ve done the research for you, sifting through the sand to help you find that perfect Long Beach apartment.
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Aerial view of Long Beach harbor
Black Lab at Belmont Shores
Sunshine, sand and saltwater at the beach
As we’ve already mentioned, location is very important in Long Beach. The city has five major areas that are vastly different from one another but since Long Beach has such easily accessible freeways, commuting to work isn’t that bad, no matter where you live. As a general rule of thumb, give yourself an hour to get from one end of Long Beach to the other during rush hour; your travel time should only be twenty minutes during off-peak times. Make sure that your work and apartment have designated parking areas though, because finding a street-parking spot anywhere in Long Beach can add hours to your commute, especially in the summer. Also, don’t plan on swimming much in Long Beach. The city is a major port, so the water is a bit grimy. Luckily, Long Beach is a great walking town, so walking along the beach can be a fun part of your workout, with no parking or swimming required.
Long Beach is known for being home to a lot of musicians, be they rappers like Snoop Dogg, or ska-masters like Sublime. Because of the prominent music culture of Long Beach, we’ve named the five major areas of Long Beach after Snoop Dogg and Sublime songs.
Long Beach has two east side areas that are commonly confused, much like Tanqueray is commonly confused with good gin. Eastside is actually the central portion of the city, whereas East Long Beach is the geographic east side of the city.
The Eastside is located south of Interstate 405, between the Los Angeles River and Ximeno Ave, and includes Downtown. Though the Eastside is generally known to have some problems, certain Eastside neighborhoods are charming as long as you’re city savvy. We recommend Retro Row, a highly walkable historic area filled with vintage clothing, bookstores and antiques; historic and lovely Rose Park; and coastal Bixby Park, a unique, community-minded urban village with a great nightlife and a large LGBTQ population. As a general rule, a 1BR apartment anywhere in the Eastside will be an affordable $800, but if you’re looking to spend more you could sip your gin and juice in a 1BR high-rise apartment in Downtown for $1400, or try nearby Belmont Heights, a parrot-filled, young and highly educated area where you can rent a 1BR house for $1150. The neighborhoods in the Eastside are highly varied, but you can expect that the closer you get to downtown, the less you’ll be seeing nuclear families and the more you’ll be seeing single young people and gay couples. If you must live in the Eastside with your family, consider Bixby Knolls. This educated, diverse and cultured area (read: no Tanqueray) lies just north of the Eastside. Those Mom’s Clubs are going to cost you though: a 2BR house in Bixby Knolls will run $1300+.
Southeast Long Beach is located further east than the Eastside, stretching along the coastline south of Interstate 405. This area tends to be expensive and pedestrian-friendly, but, like much of Long Beach along the coast, this area holds more young single people and gay couples than families. If bootylicious dance moves are what you got, a 1BR in the party-filled area around CSU Long Beach will be your dream for $900. If you’re more of an outdoors-y early riser, you’ll feel at home in gorgeous Belmont Shore where you can stroll to a large variety of water sports and awesome stores every single day. A 2BR house with an ocean view in Belmont Shore will show off that what you got is a lot, and will run you a cool $2000 or more. If you’ve already graduated and are looking to be surrounded by young, fun, highly educated single people, you might want to consider Alamitos Heights where a 1BR apartment will cost you $1100. If you can never be close enough to the beach, a 1BR beachside cottage in gorgeous Peninsula or Naples will cost you $1500, and if you live in Naples, you can take a gondola ride home.
So you just left the church and you’re looking to grow your family in a palace? This is the place for you. East Long Beach is a mainly suburban area that fills the northeast quadrant of Long Beach (past the Eastside), and is bordered by the airport, the City of Lakewood, Interstate 605, and Interstate 405. This middle-class area tends to be very community-oriented, and the palaces here are pricey. A 3BR in this area will cost about $2000. For a palatial and gorgeous home at about the same price, we recommend the lovely Lakewood Village neighborhood.
The Westside of Long Beach is a working-class neighborhood located west of the Los Angeles River, south of Interstate 405, and north of Anaheim Street.
Northtown is a working-class neighborhood in the northwest corner of Long Beach, which skims the beautiful Bixby Knolls neighborhood to the south. However, the other side of Northtown borders Lakewood (read: this area is seriously diverse). Just like the Amazon, Northtown is a difficult area to classify (is it dangerous, beautiful, or bizarre?), and the fiercely independent and insular Northtowners don’t help to answer any questions. If you’re an urban explorer and want to challenge yourself by carving out your own path, try Northtown. Rent varies just as much as the people here, but renting a 2BR house for $1000 is something you can count on.
June 2020 Long Beach Rent Report
Welcome to the June 2020 Long Beach Rent Report. Long Beach rents declined over the past month. In this report, we'll evaluate trends in the Long Beach rental market, including comparisons to cities throughout the metro, state, and nation.
June 2020 Long Beach Rent Report
Welcome to the June 2020 Long Beach Rent Report. Long Beach rents declined over the past month. In this report, we'll evaluate trends in the Long Beach rental market, including comparisons to cities throughout the metro, state, and nation.
Long Beach rents declined over the past month
Long Beach rents have remained flat over the past month, however, they have increased marginally by 0.6% year-over-year. Currently, median rents in Long Beach stand at $1,385 for a one-bedroom apartment and $1,780 for a two-bedroom. Long Beach's year-over-year rent growth lags the state average of 0.7%, as well as the national average of 0.8%.
Rents rising across the Los Angeles Metro
Throughout the past year, rent increases have been occurring not just in the city of Long Beach, but across the entire metro. Of the largest 10 cities that we have data for in the Los Angeles metro, 6 of them have seen prices rise. Here's a look at how rents compare across some of the largest cities in the metro.
- Lancaster has the least expensive rents in the Los Angeles metro, with a two-bedroom median of $1,644; the city has also experienced the fastest rent growth in the metro, with a year-over-year increase of 2.0%.
- Irvine has seen rents fall by 1.4% over the past month, the biggest drop in the metro. It's also the most expensive city in the Los Angeles metro with a two-bedroom median of $2,745.
Many large cities nationwide show more affordable rents compared to Long Beach
As rents have increased marginally in Long Beach, large cities nationwide have seen rents grow more quickly. Compared to most large cities across the country, Long Beach is less affordable for renters.
- Rents increased slightly in other cities across the state, with California as a whole logging rent growth of 0.7% over the past year. For example, rents have grown by 0.8% in San Diego and 0.2% in San Jose.
- Long Beach's median two-bedroom rent of $1,780 is above the national average of $1,194. Nationwide, rents have grown by 0.8% over the past year compared to the 0.6% increase in Long Beach.
- While Long Beach's rents rose marginally over the past year, some cities nationwide saw decreases, including Denver (-0.4%) and Boston (-0.4%).
- Renters will generally find more expensive prices in Long Beach than most large cities. For example, Houston has a median 2BR rent of $1,030, where Long Beach is more than one-and-a-half times that price.
For more information check out our national report. You can also access our full data for cities and counties across the U.S. at this link.
Methodology - Recent Updates:
Data from private listing sites, including our own, tends to skew toward luxury apartments, which introduces sample bias when estimates are calculated directly from these listings. To address these limitations, we’ve recently made major updates to our methodology, which we believe have greatly improved the accuracy and reliability of our estimates.
Read more about our new methodology below, or see a more detailed post here.
Methodology:
Apartment List is committed to making our rent estimates the best and most accurate available. To do this, we start with reliable median rent statistics from the Census Bureau, then extrapolate them forward to the current month using a growth rate calculated from our listing data. In doing so, we use a same-unit analysis similar to Case-Shiller’s approach, comparing only units that are available across both time periods to provide an accurate picture of rent growth in cities across the country.
Our approach corrects for the sample bias inherent in other private sources, producing results that are much closer to statistics published by the Census Bureau and HUD. Our methodology also allows us to construct a picture of rent growth over an extended period of time, with estimates that are updated each month.
Read more about our methodology here.
About Rent Reports:
Apartment List publishes monthly reports on rental trends for hundreds of cities across the U.S. We intend these reports to be a source of reliable information that help renters and policymakers make sound decisions, and we invest significant time and effort in gathering and analyzing rent data. Our work is covered regularly by journalists across the country.
We are continuously working to improve our methodology and data, with the goal of providing renters with the information that they need to make the best decisions.
Renter Confidence Survey
Apartment List has released Long Beach’s results from the third annual Apartment List Renter Satisfaction Survey. This survey, which drew on responses from over 45,000 renters, provides insight on what states and cities must do to meet the needs of 111 million American renters nationwide.
"Long Beach renters expressed general satisfaction with the city overall," according to Apartment Lis...
Here’s how Long Beach ranks on:
Apartment List has released Long Beach’s results from the third annual Apartment List Renter Satisfaction Survey. This survey, which drew on responses from over 45,000 renters, provides insight on what states and cities must do to meet the needs of 111 million American renters nationwide.
"Long Beach renters expressed general satisfaction with the city overall," according to Apartment List. "However, ratings varied greatly across different categories, indicating that even though renters love Long Beach, some aspects can be better."
Key findings in Long Beach include the following:
- Long Beach renters gave their city a C+ overall.
- The highest-rated categories for Long Beach were public transit (A) and weather (A-).
- The areas of concern to Long Beach renters are jobs and career opportunities and pet-friendliness, which both received D grades.
- Millennial renters are moderately satisfied with their city, giving it an overall rating of B.
- Long Beach earned similar scores to Los Angeles (C+) and San Jose (C), but earned lower marks than San Diego (A-) and San Francisco (B+).
Long Beach did relatively poorly compared to similar cities nationwide, including Austin, TX (A-), Denver, CO (B+) and Seattle, WA (B+)
The top rated cities nationwide for renter satisfaction include Scottsdale, AZ, Irvine, CA, Boulder, CO and Ann Arbor, MI. The lowest rated cities include Tallahassee, FL, Stockton, CA, Dayton, OH, Detroit, MI and Newark, NJ.
Renters say:
- "Love the diversity and the culture, but the area where we live is too busy to be walkable and isn’t great for kids." – Monisha
- "Love that the beach is just a short hop away, and all the events going on throughout the year are great. What I don’t love is the expensive increase in rent prices." – Victor S.
- "Pros: everything is close, like grocery stores, restaurants, the beach and the Pike. But the street parking is the downside. It’s hard to find a place to park." – Liselle
- "Love the slower pace than LA. Friendly atmosphere and gorgeous neighborhoods. Most places are gay-friendly. Hate the cost of living, especially the high rent." – Tammie J.
For more information on the survey methodology and findings or to speak to one of our researchers, please contact our team at rentonomics@apartmentlist.com.