Government regulation (again) exacerbates this problem. In Seattle, landlords have to give 6 months notice for rent increases. They also are obliged to pay the tenant's relocation costs when the tenant leaves. They can't evict tenants who don't pay rent. Seattle will provide free lawyers to tenants who want to sue their landlords.
So, yeah, if the real estate market is rising fast enough, it's best to not rent it.
Their rights are what is mutually agreed upon in the rental agreement.
> without laws to prevent it, landlords could arbitrarily raise rents whenever they felt like it.
Many rental contracts have clauses specifying when and how much the rent can change.
Landlords can demand whatever they want, but a tenant would have to agree to it. Tenants can also demand whatever they want, but the landlord would have to agree. That's supply & demand at work.
Yearly rent is generally going to be about 1/20th the total value of the property. So if the owner plans on doing anything to improve the value of the property by more than 5% in a given year, that improvement process is worth more than having a tenant. In a market like Vancouver, where rent-to-cost ratios are even lower, a tenant paying rent is almost irrelevant in the equation.