By Mark Ventre, Senior Vice President, Stepp Commercial As it turns out, COVID has once again delayed hopes of a return to normalized operations for apartment owners. Just when it seemed the shackles that have hindered the ability to raise rents and recoup lost income would be removed, it now appears the light at the end of the tunnel has grown more distant. Fortunately, there have been positive indicators that the economic environment in Los Angeles for the first half of 2021 has improved considerably from the second half of 2020. According to the California Labor Market, the unemployment rate lowered from 17.9 percent to 10.6 percent a year ago. Apart from the third quarter of 2020, which experienced an enormous economic bounce back of 33.4 percent, the second quarter of this year has seen a GDP increase of 6.5 percent, one of the strongest since 2003. This is great news for a city that was particularly hard hit, considering the amount of hospitality and leisure jobs. However, Los Angeles has still lagged the nation with respect to rent growth in 2021. Average asking rents have improved by 3.9 percent since the beginning of the year, far below the national average …
