Advocates for small property owners describe the rent control proposal likely headed for next fall’s ballot as the most “restrictive and aggressive” the state has seen to date, and say it would be detrimental to small landlords.
Small property owners – who provide more than 65% of Massachusetts’ rental housing, according to the Small Property Owners Association – operate on tight margins, so they’re typically only a few missed bank checks away from bankruptcy or losing their business, according to Amir Shahsavari, the organization’s vice president.
He said if these “mom and pop” businesses no longer exist, tenants will be in a “tough predicament” if properties are then taken over by larger corporations. That’s because they will no longer have a person to connect with immediately if there are issues in their building – a benefit usually provided by smaller landlords.
In addition, operating costs like utilities, insurance and particularly property taxes – which Boston Mayor Michelle Wu recently said are expected to increase by 13% in January – have risen in recent years, which factors into rents. However, if caps are put in place, advocates are concerned property owners will not be able to adapt to these costs.
“On one hand, we appreciate the pressures that renters have when they say that rent is increasing,” Shahsavari said. “But what people miss in this story is that operating costs are also going up exorbitantly for the property owner, too.”
“If (small property owners) can’t increase rents, what’s going to happen is they have to exit the market,” added Tony Lopes, a SPOA board member. “We can’t afford to supply this housing at a loss every month.”
The initiative seeks to limit annual rent increases for most residential units by either the amount of the Consumer Price Index increase or 5% – whichever value is lower – during a 12-month period. It would set base rents as of Jan. 31, 2026, but residents would not vote on the measure, which would apply to every municipality, until next November.
What must happen for the question to make the ballot
To reach the ballot, it must still go through a process that includes certification of more than 124,000 signatures, legislative review and likely another round of signature gathering if lawmakers don’t approve the proposal.
To account for small property owners, the measure includes a provision to exempt owner-occupied buildings with four or fewer units. Noemi Ramos, executive director of the New England Community Project, said because of this, the notion that the measure will impact small landlords is “out the window.”
But Shahsavari said the provision is “misleading” because property owners with four units or fewer are a minority among the small property owner community. Because of the tight limit, those who exceed this amount – which he said is the “vast majority” of small property owners – would be categorized with companies that operate on a much larger and commercialized scale.
Instead, he said the definition of a small property owner depends on a business structure’s size, scope and reach, rather than the number of units an owner manages.
“What one small owner can handle might be different from the capacity that another owner would have,” Shahsavari said. “It ultimately comes down to the degree to which the owner can manage his or her business in a hands-on way without expanding too far out to the point where they really become a conglomerate.”
Ramos said Homes For All Massachusetts, the statewide coalition behind the ballot initiative, decided to use four units as the cut-off after speaking with small property owners and deciding “what are our values when we think about how we define small landlords.”
“I remember asking a developer in the (city of Boston’s Rent Stabilization Advisory Committee), ‘How do you define a small landlord?’ and they said, ‘Fifty units or less,’” Ramos said. “When you think about 50 units, that’s a business. That’s no longer a small landlord.”
Developers say threat of rent control has ‘chilling effect’
Another provision in the initiative addresses development by exempting units where the “first residential certificate of occupancy” is under 10 years old, or 10 years from when the certificate of occupancy is validated
Tamara Small, CEO of the NAIOP Commercial Real Estate Development Association of Massachusetts, said the “threat of the (rent control) question” is already having a chilling effect on investment and development. If put in place, she said the measure would also lead to decreased quality of housing and repairs, which would result in either subpar conditions or units being taken off the market.
Antonio Ennis, a Dorchester community organizer at City Life / Vida Urbana, disagrees. He said landlords should always factor in money for property repairs and keeping buildings up to code. Ennis, a small property owner who occupies one unit and rents out two others in a three-decker, would not be affected.
Developers and property owner advocates say the primary solution to solving the state’s housing crisis is increased development, which they say rent control hinders.
“If rent control is in place in the market, investors do not go to that market. They go elsewhere,” Small said. “Without those investment dollars, projects are not built.”
“No financial decisions and investments are made on a 10-year time horizon,” added Conor Yunits, committee chair for an opposition group for the measure called Housing for Massachusetts.
Mark Martinez, staff housing attorney for the Massachusetts Law Reform Institute, pointed out that despite not having rent control for more than 30 years, Massachusetts remains behind in terms of housing production.
“This isn’t a development policy. This is a stabilization policy,” he said. “Judging a stabilization policy based off whether it’s going to spur development doesn’t make a whole lot of sense.”
He said the measure is a “commonsense” policy, but not the only measure that needs to be taken to solve the housing crisis.
“It’s going to take a decade, if not longer, to build all the housing that we need,” Martinez said. “But in the meantime, families need to be able to stay around.”
Small pointed to cities like Austin and Phoenix as models for Boston to solve its housing crisis. In both cities, an increased housing supply resulted in lower rent growth and prices.
How high are rents in Massachusetts?
Massachusetts historically has some of the nation’s highest rents, and recent reports have ranked it as the state with the second highest cost of living. In May, the Consumer Affairs Journal of Consumer Research ranked Massachusetts as the fifth worst state for renters due to a lack of affordability and availability.
“This is a statewide issue, and we’re continuing to see the crisis intensify,” said Carolyn Chou, executive director of Homes For All Massachusetts. “We can’t wait while corporate landlords come into our cities and towns and hike up the rent and displace our communities.”
Over 40% of state residents who rent are “cost-burdened,” as of 2022, meaning they pay above 30% of their incomes on housing, according to data from Harvard University’s Joint Center for Housing Studies. In some areas, such as Springfield, Boston, Cambridge, Newton and Barnstable, it’s more than 50% of renters.
Residents paying over 50% of their income on housing are classified as “severely cost burdened,” according to the Healey administration’s “A Home for Everyone” initiative. The percentage of renters in Massachusetts who fall into this category ranges from about 20%-30%, depending on the area.
When families have to spend an excess amount of their income on housing, they have less money for needs such as food, transportation and childcare. They’re also unable to “save money for opportunities that could provide a pathway to higher income, as well as wealth-building,” which includes education, job training or homeownership, according to the initiative.
“Rent is often the first place people put their money toward,” said Chelsea Sedani, director of advocacy at the Massachusetts Budget and Policy Center. “If you don’t have that, it makes a lot of other things very challenging.”
Rent control advocates say measure would help economy in other ways
Decreased rents could have an effect on the larger economy as well, because they could potentially increase purchasing power.
“If we alleviate the pressure that people are feeling around housing costs, we’re going to make it easier for them to spend in other areas of their lives,” Sedani said.
The last time Massachusetts had a rent control measure in place was in 1994 – but voters overturned it. Many opponents cite this as another reason the measure should not be implemented.
However, state Sen. Patricia Jehlen, D-Somerville, pointed out that Boston, Brookline and Cambridge voted in favor of keeping rent control before it was outlawed statewide in 1994. She said Massachusetts needs to not just create more housing but to preserve “naturally occurring affordable housing.”
“People are not going to stay in Massachusetts if we just count on building new housing,” she said. “It’s not fast enough and not cheap enough.”
High rents make it difficult for residents to plan and save money long term, so rent caps would provide predictability that would keep people in their homes longer, Martinez said.
Although both supporters and opponents presented different ways on how to approach the housing affordability crisis, they agreed on one solution: increasing the supply of housing.
“Supply, supply, supply,” Yunits said. “That’s really all there is. We’ve got to build.”
