Half Moon Bay council keeps rent-stabilization and registry in place for another year, directs data collection

The Half Moon Bay City Council voted 3-2 on May 6 to continue the city’s rent-stabilization and rental-registry programs for one year while staff collects additional data on units lost or converted, landlords who stop renting, and program costs — and studies options for exemptions for affordable housing developers and targeted rental subsidies.

The council’s action followed a staff update and a long public-comment period that included landlords, property managers, housing advocates and resident renters. City staff said the programs were launched in 2024 and 2025 to limit excessive rent increases for qualifying units and to create a registry of rental properties in city limits.

City staffer Irma Acosta of the Economic and Community Vitality Division told the council the ordinance applies to residential rental properties of two units or more built before Feb. 1, 1995 and that the allowable annual rent increase for the 2024–25 rental year was set at 2.6 percent — the lesser of 3 percent or 80 percent of the change in the Consumer Price Index. “For the rental year 2024–25 that allowable rental increase was set at 2.6%,” Acosta said.

Acosta reported that staff identified 472 units subject to the local rent‑stabilization ordinance and that 377 of those units had been registered…