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- A month-to-month increase takes 30 days' written notice if it is 10 percent or less, counted with every other increase in the past 12 months, and 90 days if it is more.
- An RSO unit can go up once every 12 months, by LAHD's allowable increase of 3 percent for July 1, 2026 through June 30, 2027, and only while the unit is registered.
- Units outside the RSO may fall under the statewide cap in Civil Code section 1947.12, which is measured from the lowest rent in the prior 12 months.
- A buyer checks each recent increase against its notice, the ledger and the tenant's estoppel certificate, so every increase needs a paper trail.
How much notice does a rent increase need?
For a month-to-month tenant, 30 days' written notice covers an increase of 10 percent or less, and anything larger takes 90 days. Civil Code section 827 measures the 10 percent against the rent charged at any time in the 12 months before the new rent starts, and it adds the increase to any others in those 12 months. Serve it by mail and section 827 applies Code of Civil Procedure section 1013 to the timing as well, so personal delivery keeps the count simple.
A lease is another matter. It fixes the rent for its term, so read each one, and unless a lease ends before you list, the rents you can change before a sale are the month-to-month ones.
With invented numbers, take a unit under the statewide cap that rented for $2,000 a year ago and went to $2,100 in January. You would like $2,220 by September, ahead of listing. Against the $2,000, that is an 11 percent increase within 12 months, so section 827 would require 90 days' notice. It would also break the cap, which never allows more than 10 percent over 12 months, measured from the lowest rent in that time. On these figures the most the cap could allow is $2,200, and less if 5 percent plus the change in the cost of living comes to under 10 percent.
How much can the rent go up?
That turns on which law covers the unit, and the unit keeps its coverage through the sale.
| Unit | Limit on the increase | Where to check |
|---|---|---|
| Under the City of Los Angeles RSO | Once every 12 months, by the allowable increase, which LAHD set at 3 percent for July 1, 2026 through June 30, 2027. Since February 2, 2026 the formula is 90 percent of the average CPI, with a floor of 1 percent and a ceiling of 4 percent, and no added percentage for landlord-paid utilities. | LAHD's renter protections page and its RSO rent increase calculator |
| Under the statewide cap | 5 percent plus the change in the cost of living, or 10 percent, whichever is lower, over any 12 months, measured from the lowest rent in that time. In effect until January 1, 2030. | Civil Code section 1947.12 and the Attorney General's rent cap page |
| In unincorporated Los Angeles County, under the County's rent stabilization ordinance | 1.919 percent for most fully covered units, through June 30, 2027. | The County's rent increase bulletin |
The City's Just Cause Ordinance protects tenants outside the RSO from eviction without a stated cause, but it does not regulate rent, so those units look to the statewide cap unless an exemption applies. The cap's exemptions include housing whose certificate of occupancy was issued within the previous 15 years. Santa Monica, West Hollywood and several other cities in the county run rent control of their own, each with its own annual figure.
For an RSO unit, registration comes first. LAHD requires every unit rented or offered for rent to be registered each year, has the owner give each tenant a copy of the annual registration certificate, and says no rent may legally be collected on a unit that is not currently registered. An increase served on an unregistered unit starts from a rent LAHD says could not lawfully be collected at all.
When a lawful amount still causes trouble
Timing can defeat an increase that is the right size. Civil Code section 1942.5 bars a landlord who is retaliating against a tenant from raising the rent within 180 days after the tenant gives notice of needed repairs, complains to the landlord about the unit's condition, or files a complaint about it with a government agency. Before you serve anything, look through each unit's file for a repair request or a complaint in the last 180 days.
Los Angeles adds its Tenant Anti-Harassment Ordinance. LAMC section 45.33 treats bad faith conduct aimed at a tenant that causes harm as harassment, and the acts it lists include:
- reducing or eliminating housing services that the lease, a contract or the law requires
- failing to perform necessary health and safety repairs and maintenance in a timely way
- threatening a tenant by word or gesture
- trying to coerce a tenant to move out with offers of money
None of those is a rent increase. Any of them can land in the same months as a pre-sale increase, though, and an increase served while a repair sits undone or a parking space the lease includes goes away hands the tenant facts that match the ordinance's list. Penalties under LAMC section 45.35 run from $2,000 to $10,000 per violation.
If a tenant has complained about the unit in the last 180 days, or has pushed back hard on an earlier increase, get a landlord-tenant attorney's view before you serve a notice. Shaya, who is not a lawyer, can tell you what the increase would mean to a buyer, and the attorney can tell you whether to serve it.
How a buyer reads a recent increase
A buyer pays for the rent roll, so it tests the newest numbers hardest. For each unit that went up in the last year, expect the buyer to line these up:
- the notice, its date and the way it was served, against the 30 or 90 days section 827 required
- the size of the increase, counted with any other in the prior 12 months, against the RSO's allowable increase or the statewide cap
- for an RSO unit, that year's registration and rent registry filing
- the ledger, to see whether the tenant pays the new rent or the old one
- the tenant's estoppel certificate, where the tenant states the rent in the tenant's own words
An estoppel that gives a lower rent than your roll, or a ledger showing the old amount still coming in, turns a recent increase into a question the buyer will price. If the new rent starts after closing, the buyer needs proof the notice was served correctly, because the buyer is the one who will collect it.
A run of increases just before listing, each at the limit, tells a buyer the rent roll has already gone as far as the law allows for the next 12 months.
Before you serve an increase ahead of a sale
- Confirm each unit's coverage with LAHD's RSO property search or the rules above, and for RSO units confirm the registration is current.
- Find the date and amount of the last increase, since the RSO allows one in 12 months and both section 827 and the cap count every increase in that window.
- Read the file for repair requests and complaints, to you or to an agency, in the past 180 days.
- Serve the notice in writing, with the right period, and keep proof of how and when it was served.
- Update the ledger and the rent roll on the day the new rent starts, and keep the notice in the tenant's file for the buyer.
A bill to lower the statewide cap, AB 1157, failed in the Assembly Judiciary Committee on January 13, 2026, so that bill left section 1947.12 as it was.