1609 Apartments for rent in Los Angeles, CA
📍Moving to Los Angeles is the continuation of the American dream, of traveling west towards the setting sun and carving out a life on the edge of the world.
The good news: You can do it. Renting an apartment in LA is far easier and less expensive than in cities of comparable size like San Francisco and New York. Legions of dreamers, wanderers, pioneers, artists and those in search for a better life have picked up and moved to the belly of the beast, and so can you.
The bad news: Los Angeles has over 100 definable neighborhoods, and deciding which one of them to live in can be intimidating. However, if you do your research, you too can join the masses in the land of milk and honey, the entertainment capital of the world, the center of the universe: the City of Angels.
Having trouble with Craigslist Los Angeles? Can't find that special apartment for rent on Apartment Finder or Zillow? Apartment List is here to help!
Santa Monica Pier
Frank Gehry's famous Getty Museum
Venice Beach lifeguard towers
- Consider your commute. The most important factor when deciding on a pad in Los Angeles is your proximity to the workplace. You generally want to live as close to that location as you can. Nothing affects the quality of life more in LA than the length of your commute, which, as you have probably heard, is infamous for its congestion. Test-drive the length of your commute before you sign a lease to get a real idea of what your time in the car will be like.
- Have a car. Moving to Los Angeles with no vehicle is like moving to Mars without a rover. While public transportation exists, the system is nothing like what you would find in New York, Boston or Paris. Los Angeles is not a walkable city – hell, we drive our cars to the corner coffee shop – and if you don’t have wheels, your options become extremely limited.
- Drive around. Many landlords, especially those with only one or two units, will never list their properties online. The only way to find out about these smaller and more unique spaces is to drive around the neighborhood that you want to live in and look for “For Rent” signs in windows. This is easiest to do with a friend, who can write down phone numbers and addresses while you drive.
- Call before you visit the apartment. Whether you are searching for apartments online or in the newspaper, always call first to find out more information before making the trek to see the place in person. A phone call can often weed out many of your options, and you don’t want to be running all over LA for no reason.
- Set your budget, then search slightly above it. Some rental properties in LA include cable service, Internet connection, water, wastewater and utilities, and some include none of these. A $1000 rental that includes all of the above is a much better deal than a place for $900 that includes nothing – even if it’s a hundred or so over budget. Trust us, you’ll be wishing you took the all-inclusive when that first bill comes in.
- Think about parking! When you move to LA, you will have to devote a much larger space in your brain to parking, so you might as well start now. Does your apartment come with a parking space? If you will have street parking, check signs for the street cleaning schedule and for any other times (like rush hour) your car would have to be parked somewhere else. A parking spot that you can call your own is worth quite a bit in LA.
- Get a Thomas Guide. This is the map that Angelenos swear by, and you will likely find one in almost every home and car. Thick, heavy and hundreds of pages of long, the Thomas Guide is the recognized source for street information that the city relies on. Not big on maps? Make sure you have a working GPS to find your way around the city.
If you don’t already have opportunities lined up in a particular area of Los Angeles, then your options are pretty open. Talking to locals is always the best way to figure out a new neighborhood.
Whichever side you happen to choose will most likely be where you spend the great majority of your time. Commuting back and forth across the city can, and probably will, drain your time, money, and sanity. Living somewhere on the west side – say, Venice or Santa Monica – will be more conducive to relaxing on the beach on your off days whereas east-siders will only see the beach if absolutely necessary. We really mean it when we say the traffic is that bad in LA. Furthermore, the geographical reality of Los Angeles makes your choice of a neighborhood very important; when people ask you where you’re from, you don’t just say “LA” but rather: Silver Lake, K-Town, Venice Beach or Hollywood!
Santa Monica: A polished seaside city with a famous pier, Santa Monica is the epitome of the west LA. Shops and gourmet restaurants make Santa Monica a place of ease. Santa Monica is a very livable neighborhood, with the farmer’s market on Main Street every Sunday morning.
Venice Beach: If you are determined to live by the beach, Venice might be a good option.
Westwood/Century City: Century City is a business center that turns into a practical ghost town at night. Westwood is next door, and has plenty of restaurants and bars.
Culver City: Long known as a movie and TV production Mecca. You can find an apartment here for a decent price.
Beverly Hills: A separate city from Los Angeles altogether. With shopping along Rodeo Drive.
West Hollywood: West Hollywood (or We-Ho) is one of the cleanest and most stylish areas in Los Angeles. West Hollywood is full of clothing shops, and new eateries.
Hollywood: Hollywood is where many people first land when they arrive in LA. You'll be living in the thick of things.
Silver Lake: This neighborhood is full of organic cafes, eclectic boutiques, dive bars, and chilled-out coffee shops. Located between Echo Park and Glendale, Silver Lake has a central location, just 10-15 minutes to downtown or Hollywood. Finding an affordable apartment here isn’t easy, but with enough legwork it can be done.
Echo Park: Echo Park has cute little shops, and vegan cafe.. Echo Park Lake is quite beautiful during the day, Dodger Stadium is around the corner, and the Echo and the Echoplex venues both see a lot of hot musical action all throughout the year.
Los Feliz: This pretty area is a relatively chill place to come home to from the madness of LA. It features quick access to neighboring Griffith Park and some particularly gorgeous homes, that is, if you can afford to live in one.
Wilshire/Midtown: Centered on Wilshire Blvd. It’s also home to Koreatown (or K-town), where you can find an apartment in any price range.
Downtown: Downtown Los Angeles is the heart of the city. You can rent a chic new loft with a killer view for an amazing price..
Now that you’ve been outfitted with the proper tools, tip, and tricks, we’re confident that finding the LA apartment of your dreams is definitely within reach. LA is a big place gleaming with opportunity, and it’s up to you to grab it, like life, by the horns. Now go forth, dear apartment hunter, and claim your piece of this angelic city.
July 2020 Los Angeles Rent Report
Welcome to the July 2020 Los Angeles Rent Report. Los Angeles rents declined over the past month. In this report, we'll evaluate trends in the Los Angeles rental market, including comparisons to cities throughout the metro, state, and nation.
July 2020 Los Angeles Rent Report
Welcome to the July 2020 Los Angeles Rent Report. Los Angeles rents declined over the past month. In this report, we'll evaluate trends in the Los Angeles rental market, including comparisons to cities throughout the metro, state, and nation.
Los Angeles rents declined moderately over the past month
Los Angeles rents have declined 0.3% over the past month, and are down slightly by 0.5% in comparison to the same time last year. Currently, median rents in Los Angeles stand at $1,360 for a one-bedroom apartment and $1,747 for a two-bedroom. This is the third straight month that the city has seen rent decreases after an increase in March. Los Angeles' year-over-year rent growth lags the state average of 0.1%, as well as the national average of 0.2%.
Rents rising across the Los Angeles Metro
While rent prices have decreased in Los Angeles over the past year, the rest of the metro is seeing the opposite trend. Rents have risen in 5 of the largest 10 cities in the Los Angeles metro for which we have data. Here's a look at how rents compare across some of the largest cities in the metro.
- Irvine has the most expensive rents in the Los Angeles metro, with a two-bedroom median of $2,714; however, the city has also seen rents fall by 1.1% over the past month, the biggest drop in the metro.
- Lancaster has the least expensive rents in the Los Angeles metro, with a two-bedroom median of $1,646; additionally, the city has seen rent growth of 0.1% over the past month, the fastest in the metro.
Similar cities nationwide show more affordable rents compared to Los Angeles
As rents have fallen moderately in Los Angeles, a few other large cities nationwide have seen prices increase, in some cases substantially. Compared to most similar cities across the country, Los Angeles is less affordable for renters.
- Although rents across cities in California have been slightly on the rise, the state's growth as a whole has held steady over the past year. For example, rents have grown by 0.4% in San Diego.
- Los Angeles' median two-bedroom rent of $1,747 is above the national average of $1,192. Nationwide, rents have held steady over the past year.
- While rents in Los Angeles fell moderately over the past year, the city of Phoenix saw an increase of 1.9%.
- Renters will generally find more expensive prices in Los Angeles than most other large cities. For example, Houston has a median 2BR rent of $1,025, where Los Angeles 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 Los Angeles’ results from the third annual Apartment List Renter Satisfaction Survey. This survey, which drew on responses from over 45,000 renters nationwide, provides insight on what states and cities must do to meet the needs of the country’s 111 million renters.
"Los Angeles renters expressed general satisfaction with the city overall," according to Apartme...
Here’s how Los Angeles ranks on:
Apartment List has released Los Angeles’ results from the third annual Apartment List Renter Satisfaction Survey. This survey, which drew on responses from over 45,000 renters nationwide, provides insight on what states and cities must do to meet the needs of the country’s 111 million renters.
"Los Angeles renters expressed general satisfaction with the city overall," according to Apartment List. "They gave most categories near average scores."
Key Findings in Los Angeles include the following:
- Los Angeles renters gave their city a C+ overall.
- The highest-rated categories for Los Angeles were weather and public transit, which received grades of A and B+, respectively.
- The areas of concern to Los Angeles renters are quality of local schools, commute time and affordability, which all received D grades.
- Millennial renters are unsatisfied with their city, giving it an overall rating of C, while renters who are parents were less satisfied, giving it a D grade.
- Los Angeles did relatively poorly compared to other cities in California, including San Diego (A-) and San Francisco (B+), but scored higher than San Jose (C) and Sacramento (C).
- Los Angeles did relatively poorly compared to similar cities nationwide, including Houston (B+), Denver (B+) and Atlanta (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:
- "I love that there are so many things to do in LA and the surrounding cities, but I hate the high cost of living." -Crystal R.
- "It’s expensive and there is no public transit, but there are lots of hidden gems and the weather is always great." -Brandi S.
- "LA is notoriously expensive and with bad traffic. However, the weather, diversity, and attitude make it more than worth it!" -Kristen G.
- "I love the music scene in Los Angeles; it’s very vibrant and always changing." -Dustin S.
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.