Asking Rents in Wine Country Jump in Wildfires’ Immediate Wake

• Compared to September, advertised rents in Mid-October in California’s Napa and Sonoma Counties rose much more than in neighboring counties largely unaffected by recent wildfires.
• Most rental properties on the market in Napa and Sonoma Counties in mid-October appear to be new rental listings, having not been on the market on Zillow during the previous eight years.

An early look at mid-October advertised rents on Zillow in California’s Napa and Sonoma Counties, which have both lost thousands of homes to a series of devastating wildfires, suggests an increase in rents from September, but also an increase in rental listings.

In Sonoma County, asking rents are up $0.64 per square foot in Sonoma County (from $1.82 in September to $2.48 per square foot the week of Oct. 12-18); advertised rents are up $0.45 per square foot in Napa County over the same period (from $1.93 to $2.38 per square foot). In the city of Santa Rosa, the seat of Sonoma County and the largest community in the region, asking rents were up $0.30 per square foot (from $1.83 to $2.13 per square foot). By comparison, over the summer asking rents rose on average $0.02 per square foot each month in Sonoma County, were flat over each month in Napa County, and rose $0.03 per square foot each month in Santa Rosa.

Most properties listed for rent in these two counties also appear to be relatively new listings, having not appeared on the market previously in Zillow’s history. This suggests that some otherwise vacant units or vacation properties may be listing as owners seek to provide shelter for families who have lost their homes.

It’s important to note that most rental properties in the area are single-family homes, not traditional apartments in large, professionally managed, multifamily buildings, and these rental properties tend to be bigger and/or more expensive per month than other types of rentals. The typical rental property is 1,300 square feet, so these increases translate into a $585 increase (to $3,094 per month) in asking rent in Napa County, an $858 increase (to $3,224 per month) in asking rent in Sonoma County, and a $390 increase (to $2,769 per month) in asking rent in Santa Rosa.

The recent increases in the areas most impacted by the wildfires were much larger than the changes in asking rents seen in neighboring Marin and Solano Counties, which were largely unaffected by the fires.

Looking only at the very small number of rental properties that were on the market in both September and in mid-October, asking rents on these same properties fell $0.07 per square foot from September to mid-October in Marin County, but increased $0.30 per square foot in Sonoma County and increased $0.07 per square foot in Solano County. There were no properties advertised on Zillow in both time periods in Napa County.

But while rents do appear to have sharply increased in many cases in the counties most directly affected by the fires, it is still premature to draw final conclusions about the size of the increase. The data analyzed do not fully control for the mix of properties listed for rent at a given time and are based on a relatively small number of listings compared to what Zillow typically reports, so the comparison is not definitive. In the wake of the fires, the region’s housing market is in flux, and California law generally prohibits price increases on essential supplies (including rental housing) of more than 10 percent during a state emergency. To the extent that excessive hikes may occur, they are unlikely to be advertised on public listings portals such as Zillow.