"The landlord owns a very expensive illiquid property. He can't just sell it tomorrow but I could easily choose another rental." It is not necessarily easy to

"The landlord owns a very expensive illiquid property. He can't just sell it tomorrow but I could easily choose another rental." It is not necessarily easy to move. It can mean a longer or harder commute. It can mean changing which school your children go to (which can be a hardship for them). It can mean losing a connection to some social circle or religious organization (yes, this matters to some people). Trying to stay in the same neighborhood can mean dealing with the same management company, thanks to local governments giving developers effective monopolies over entire neighborhoods. Landlords do not need to sell their property in order to enter a new market; they can use one property as collateral to take out a loan for another. That is more or less how real estate developers operate. "Its very expensive to fill a rental. A landlord usually needs at least a month to find another tenant. That's a month of foregone rent" In the NYC region every landlord I have dealt with has included a clause in the contract requiring 60 days notice before moving out, and reserve the right to bring potential new tenants into my apartment to show it off before I even leave (while I am still paying rent and living in the unit). It is also more expensive than one month's rent to move, at least in my experience in this area, and landlords are notorious for keeping security deposits as payment for "repairs" to their units. "Landlords also have an interest in the community as they own equity in that community that would appreciate if the neighborhood gets nicer" I have yet to see any landlord voluntarily do anything to improve a community. In every case where a property owner has done something to improve a neighborhood, it has been because they were forced in some way by the local government. When neighborhoods decline in ways that threaten their profits, landlords seem to just demand that the government step in rather than taking any action themselves. "I don't see your point." It is not hard to understand. Landlords, especially larger management companies with many large properties, have built-in advantages over their tenants that are not corrected by market forces.