Landlord Explains Why He Hasn’t Raised His Tenant’s Rent in 5 Years

One landlord says he has watched rents climb around him for years and keeps coming back to the same question: if his property is already making money, why squeeze his tenant for more?

The anonymous landlord owns a duplex with a mortgage in what he describes only as a fast-growing city. One unit is occupied by a single mother raising four children.

In a Sept. 3 Reddit post, he said he charges the family $1,200 per month for a three-bedroom unit with a private garage, basement, deck, and yard. He says the rent covers most of his mortgage and that he has not increased it in five years.

His reasoning is not especially complicated. Raising the rent might put more money in his pocket, he wrote, but it could also force four children out of their home and potentially into different schools.

He Says The Numbers Already Work

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As a landlord, I cannot stomach the greed of most other landlords
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The landlord said his property produces healthy cash flow at the current rent, leaving him little reason to demand more simply because other rents in the area may be rising.

Instead, he directed his frustration toward landlords who pay heavily for investment properties and then try to recover the cost through high rents and repeated increases.

“It genuinely makes me sick,” he wrote in the post.

The poster does not identify his city, and his account of the property and tenant cannot be independently verified. Without a location, it is also impossible to meaningfully compare his $1,200 rent with the local market.

Rent Has Climbed Sharply Nationwide

No matter the going rate in the landlord’s unnamed city, renters across the country have seen their housing costs climb substantially in recent years. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics shows its index for rent of a primary residence increased by almost 29% from July 2021 to July 2026.

Those costs have a downstream effect that, for many households, means there is less room to budget. The U.S. Census Bureau found that 49.7% of renter households were spending more than 30% of their income on housing costs in 2023. These figures meet the federal definition of being “cost burdened.” Congress‘s official government website defines cost burdened as “spending more than 30% of household income on housing costs.”

The squeeze has not disappeared. In 2024, median gross rent, which includes rent and utilities, reached $1,487 per month, up 2.7% from the previous year even after adjusting for inflation, according to the Census Bureau. Renters continued directing a median 31% of their income toward those costs.

One Of His Predictions Is Already Happening

The landlord later edited to add another complaint: forcing renters to subscribe to an Internet package. He predicted that more renters would eventually find internet service bundled into their leases as another required monthly charge.

That practice already exists. In a 2024 case against major landlord Invitation Homes, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) alleged that tenants were charged mandatory fees for services including smart-home technology, utility management and internet packages that they could not opt out of.

Rental fees have since drawn broader federal scrutiny. In March 2026, the FTC opened a rulemaking process focused on potentially unfair or deceptive rental charges, including mandatory fees that may not be clear to renters when a property is advertised.