My coworkers in Berkeley are all telling their property managers that they need to either lower the rent or they're not going to renew. Once the UC system said they weren't opening back up for physical classes in the fall demand for places near campus dropped considerably.

My landlord hasn't lowered rent, but to incentivize us to stay he replaced our washing machine and upgraded some stuff around the property. That being said if my company ends up going fully remote (which looks likely) I'll probably be leaving the bay area anyways.

> Once the UC system said they weren't opening back up for physical classes in the fall demand for places near campus dropped considerably.

You've been given bad info. The UC President said all campuses will be open in the fall, in a hybrid mode. Berkeley's Chancellor has said that labs will be open with restrictions, but most likely lectures will not.

That of course could change.

One of the properties I manage is in Berkeley. I just renewed the lease in May, but I put in a clause that allows the tenants to cancel if classes are cancelled. They wanted to make sure they had housing secured in case classes came back. I also told them we would reduce the rent in the Fall if necessary.

As a landlord, I'd much rather have renters at a reduced rate than none at all, even if that rent is near zero, just to keep the place occupied to reduce crime.

UC Berkeley has not yet made a decision on whether classes will open in the fall. There are three possible plans for the fall at the moment [1].

The UC President has said that they expect a hybrid mode of instruction, but it's not clear whether there will be in person classes. It seems like each school themselves have a say in the decision.

> Napolitano indicated that each UC campus would be required to “meet system-wide thresholds” for Covid-19 testing, contact tracing and isolation before being allowed to open.

> Once the standards are met, campuses “can consider whether to maintain fully remote instruction in the fall or return some portion of their students to campus.”

> A decision is expected in the middle of June. [2]

A Berkeley CS professor also posted that he thinks the fall term will (and should) be online-only: https://www.reddit.com/r/berkeley/comments/g9vxb0/why_i_thin...

[1] https://news.berkeley.edu/2020/05/06/an-update-on-uc-berkele... [2] https://www.mercurynews.com/2020/05/20/coronavirus-universit...

I think you just said the same thing I did.

You said that Berkeley would be open, but there is a real possibility that no classes will be held on campus at all.

From my post:

"Berkeley's Chancellor has said that labs will be open with restrictions, but most likely lectures will not."

"Labs" in this context means supplemental classes of ~20 people associated with a lecture, especially when lectures are often ~200+ people. If I'm taking a CS class, I might go to lab two times a week to reinforce and cover topics learned in lecture. (See [1] for an example of the colloquial usage of "lab.")

So when I say "classes will be closed," I mean that labs will not be open.

[1] https://www.reddit.com/r/berkeley/comments/c3r8f0/what_happe...

As a graduate of Berkeley, I'm well aware of the colloquial use of the term "labs". However, that is not the way the Chancellor is using it in her statements.

She means the more standard definition of "places where there is equipment for students and professors to use for research".

She is saying that campus labs (rooms with special equipment for research) will most likely be open in the fall with extra precautions, and that classes may be remote only or they may offer both remote and in person options, but they haven't decided yet.

But she's pretty adamant that students and professors will have access to their equipment for research.

So no, campus will not be closed. Classes may be closed, which I said initially.

I'm not sure why you're arguing with me. We said the same thing. You just said it in a different way, and I'm not sure why.

"My landlord hasn't lowered rent, but to incentivize us to stay he replaced our washing machine and upgraded some stuff around the property."

So what he should have been doing anyway. Amazing.

Was the washing machine broken before the replacement?

Yes.

People are moving out but not in. Move-ins determine the rental market price.

This is an oversimplification of already simple market dynamics. What sets the market is the supply and demand. If demand drops sharply after an event like covid-19 and supply is held constant, prices will go down except in extremely distorted markets like the ones ISPs and telcos play in.

There are two parties to the transaction. The market clearing rate is set when the two parties agree. When one party is not showing up, there is no market clearing rate.

The intrinsic value may in fact be down, but there is no way to know for sure without two parties in the transaction.

Over time, he's right in principle. But maybe, there just hasn't been enough time yet for it to play out. if we're seeing price declines, then it's already playing out.