Tucson Mayor Regina Romero is urging the Arizona Legislature to give cities the power to impose rent control. It is a request rooted in good intentions – helping families afford the cost of housing – but it is built on a policy idea with a long, well-documented record of failure. Rent control has been tried in cities across the country for decades, and the results are unmistakable: fewer homes get built, existing units deteriorate, and affordability gets worse, not better.

Economists rarely speak with one voice. But on rent control, the verdict is unanimous. Decades of research show that rent control discourages new construction, depresses reinvestment in older housing, and ultimately shrinks the supply of homes. When supply falls behind demand, prices rise. That isn’t a theory – it’s what’s happened every time rent control has been enacted.

The most recent and dramatic example is Saint Paul, Minnesota. In 2021, Saint Paul enacted the strictest rent control law in America, capping annual rent increases at just 3%. What followed was immediate and devastating. Building permit applications collapsed by 80% almost overnight. Developers pulled out of projects mid-stream. Financing dried up. Builders simply chose to work in neighboring communities without rent caps. Within a year, the Saint Paul City Council was forced to gut the law because the damage was so severe. This is not an abstract warning, it’s a real-world case study in how quickly rent control chokes off desperately needed housing. 

This pattern is not unique. In older rent-controlled markets like New York City, decades of artificial limits on rents have left buildings deteriorating, repairs delayed, and investment stagnant. A national survey shows more than 60% of housing providers under rent control report having to postpone nonessential maintenance because the economics no longer pencil out. When owners cannot reinvest, residents ultimately suffer.

Rent control also weakens the financial backbone of cities themselves. Property values decline under rent caps, which leads to lower property-tax revenues – the funding source for schools, parks, public safety, and essential infrastructure like roads and sewers. At a time when cities are struggling to address homelessness and fight crime, rent control would shrink local budgets and make those challenges harder to solve.

Arizona cannot afford to go down this path. Our state must continue to grow its housing supply to meet demand, driven in part by the more than 100,000 new residents who move to Arizona each year. The only sustainable way to increase affordability is to build more homes across all price points. Business leaders, housing experts, and economists agree: expanding supply is the fastest and most reliable way to stabilize rents.

The Phoenix metro area is proof. As thousands of new homes and apartments have come online, rent prices have fallen for 11 consecutive months. This is Econ 101 in real time. When supply grows, prices moderate. Rent control would reverse this progress by discouraging the very construction we need.

Rent control tries to treat a symptom rather than the underlying issue. Arizona’s challenge is simple: we do not have enough housing. The solution is equally straightforward – build more of it. That requires reducing regulatory barriers, accelerating approvals, and encouraging investment in both new construction and existing properties.

For Arizona, rent control is not a solution. It is a proven mistake. We should learn from the failures seen across the country and stay focused on what actually works – increasing supply, supporting responsible development, and ensuring every Arizonan has access to a home they can afford.

Courtney Gilstrap LeVinus is president and CEO of the Arizona Multihousing Association.