I don't think I've ever heard of a rent control law that allowed setting "excessively high rents" to try to preemptively counter it. California rent stabilizat

I don't think I've ever heard of a rent control law that allowed setting "excessively high rents" to try to preemptively counter it. California rent stabilization doesn't have any stipulations about starting rent for new tenants, only increases for existing tenants. While I haven't seen it explicitly stated anywhere, I assume California landlords take into account the rent increase restrictions when deciding on what to ask for starting rent. They don't want to be caught in a situation with a 20% insurance increase and a max 8% rent increase, such that they are no longer cash flowing. So they'll add some buffer ahead of time.