Should SLO create a rental registry? Landlords, renters clash at council meeting
The city of San Luis Obispo is exploring the idea of requiring landlords to enter their properties into a database to track rental prices — and some property owners aren’t happy about the plan.
Before a sea of tenants clad in shades of orange and landlords and property managers sporting purple LED necklaces, the City Council heard arguments for and against the creation of a rental property registry that would track the price of rental units across a city of nearly 15,000 rentals.
While no formal action was taken, the study session gave the council a chance to hear estimates on the costs and benefits of a rental registry, and gave landlords and tenants the space to air their feelings on the proposal.
The registry would provide more up-to-date code enforcement, monitor rent prices and notify the city of unlicensed rentals, but the costs of operating it would be passed on to tenants, Realtor and property manager Steven Ferrario warned.
Ferrario said a registry would do little on its own to improve affordability for renters, and it could serve as a bridge to implementing rent control, which landlords would certainly oppose.
A more streamlined process that relies on business license data would “accomplish everything the registry is aiming to do, and in the process, not add another regulatory layer and save hundreds of thousands in additional costs which will be levied on property owners, who will simply pass those costs on to their tenants,” Ferrario said. “I know I will.”
Kari Howell, a San Luis Obispo County Homeless Management Information System program manager speaking as a renter, said she’s seen her rent increase to the legal maximum every year for the past eight years.
Howell said the city should move forward forcefully and without delay to implement a registry as a means of holding landlords accountable.
“I don’t think the property managers do it because they’re bad. I don’t think they’re bad landlords. I don’t think they’re malicious, and I don’t think we’re bad tenants. I think property managers and landlords do it because they can,” Howell said. “For too long, we have relied on the kindness of landlords to fill the gaps in our housing policies.”
What would a rental registry cost?
Tuesday’s study session was held about four months after an initial Renter Protections Study Session in which the council heard feedback from landlords and tenants and reviewed ideas such as the rental registry, expanded eviction protections beyond the existing Tenant Protection Act and rent stabilization.
More than 35 California municipalities employ a rental registry of some kind, according to the staff report. Nearby, Monterey launched its Rental Inventory Program in 2023, to the tune of $236,000 annually and a $50 per-unit annual fee.
Should San Luis Obispo move forward with a registry of its own, the program would likely be an offshoot of the business license program administered by the Finance Department, according to the staff report.
As is, the city requires a business license for all rental properties, and the data-gathering aspect of a rental registry could be in part folded into the licensing process, including details on owner information, rent amount and basic property characteristics such as age, number of units and square footage, according to the staff report.
A mandatory registry would require all rental properties to register with the city via a software-based program that would come with penalties for noncompliance starting after the first year, according to the staff report. For comparison, most cities that run a voluntary registry program only register around 20% of their total properties in the first year of the program’s existence.
In SLO, the software that would track the data would cost between $10,000 and $50,000 per year, and the program would require three full-time hires that could cost as much as $300,000 to $500,000 per year, according to the staff report.
The city may not recover the costs of staffing and software associated with the business license program with the added function of tracking rent, but may recover more costs over time, according to the staff report. As is, the city takes in around $300,000 a year in business taxes from residential rental businesses, which pay a minimum tax of $25 per license operator per year.
Most of the program’s operations would pay for themselves after the first couple of years, according to the staff report. Currently, Monterey’s program pays for 90% of its own costs, according to the staff report.
San Luis Obispo has a homeownership rate of 38%, with the other 62% of households being tenant-occupied — well under the California homeownership rate of 55.8%, according to Tuesday’s staff report.
Practically peaking, the 62% of homes occupied by tenants make up 14,870 of the 23,984 housing units in the city.
Meanwhile, the residents of those dwellings pay an average rent of $3,200 a month — 39% higher than the state average and 59% higher than the national average, the staff report said.
While around 60% of the city’s residents are renters, 64% of those renters are considered exempt from the Tenant Protection Act because the homes are owned by small landlords and not larger companies.
As a result, over 55% of renters in the city are considered cost-burdened, meaning they spend more than 30% of their income on rent, and over 30% of renter households are severely cost-burdened, meaning they spend more than 50% of their income on rent, according to the Oct. 28 staff report.
Property owners, tenants far apart on rental registry
Concerns voiced by landlords persisted at Tuesday’s study session, with the majority of public comments coming from landlords who oppose the registry.
Many of the landlords who spoke during Tuesday’s study session questioned what the end goal of introducing a rent registry would be, fearing future actions that could raise their costs.
Monterey Mayor Tyller Williamson spoke during public comment and shared his experience with his city’s rental registry.
He said data sources such as Zillow and RentCafe simply aren’t accurate enough because they are based on advertised unit prices online, and don’t provide the up-to-date information a registry would collect.
Fears of landlord or tenant data being available to the general public have been unfounded, he said — as have discussions of using the registry as a stepping stone to rent control.
“There were concerns about publishing rent information that neighbors might compare rates and create conflict,” Williamson said. “We heard that as well, and since implementation nearly three years ago, we have seen those concerns not materialize.”
“There were also fears that registry was a step toward rent control; after two years, our council has not broached that conversation,” he continued. “In fact, staff’s early comparative data analysis suggests rent decreased compared to our first year.”
For its part, the City Council seemed to be in agreement on moving forward with a registry in one form or another.
City manager Whitney McDonald said next steps would include making a registry part of the city’s financial plan while city staff conduct more research and outreach.
A code enforcement conversation is coming in May, where the council can gather more information on the best strategies to address the concerns of tenants.
While council members expressed some reservations about the end goals of a rental registry, all were in agreement that getting more information on the city’s rental supply would be in the city’s best interest, Councilmember Mike Boswell said.
“We have a $117 million general fund budget,” Boswell said. “I think we could spend $300,000 a year on 60% of our community.”
This story was originally published February 25, 2026 at 11:44 AM.
