Sell Your Commercial Property Fast In San Jose, CA

Who rents in San Jose

San Jose is the largest city in the Bay Area by population, with 990,138 residents in the 2020–2024 American Community Survey. Of its 328,550 occupied homes, 145,219, or 44.2%, are rented. Median household income is $146,427, not far below the Santa Clara County median of $164,281 reported in the county-level ACS.

Those incomes help keep the city's rents high. The neighborhoods named on our San Jose page, Downtown, North San Jose, Willow Glen and Berryessa, are all inside city limits, so the city figures cover them.

San José State University is a large and growing source of renters. In August 2025, SJSU reported that nearly 40,000 students were enrolled for fall 2025, an 8% increase over fall 2024 and the highest single-term total in the university's history, including about 8,700 new undergraduates, roughly 5,100 first-year students and 3,600 transfers. Another 3,800 graduate students were enrolled through its Professional and Continuing Education programs. The university's home page now headlines nearly 41,000 students starting fall 2026, so growth has continued. SJSU's facts page lists more than 3,700 employees and 2,120 faculty members, and reports that 42.8% of its students come from Santa Clara County, with another 20.2% from the East Bay. The campus is in downtown San José.

Rents and affordability

Median gross rent in San Jose was $2,669 a month over 2020–2024, below the Santa Clara County median of $2,857. Even with high incomes, 48.4% of the city's renter households pay 30% or more of income on rent, and 22.9% pay half or more, per ACS table B25070. For comparison, the countywide 30%-plus share is 43.3%, and the countywide share paying half or more is 20.2%, so the city's renters are somewhat more stretched than the county's.

HUD's FY2026 fair market rents for the San Jose-Sunnyvale-Santa Clara metro are among the highest in California. They set the baseline for voucher payment standards and are shown below alongside key city figures.

FMRs are from HUD's FY2026 schedule for the San Jose-Sunnyvale-Santa Clara MSA. The two-bedroom FMR of $3,483 sits well above the city's median gross rent, a gap that matters when a buyer models what units could rent for at turnover.

The apartment stock

San Jose has 345,066 housing units, and 94,758 of them, or 27.5%, are in buildings with five or more units, per ACS table B25024. More than half of those, 49,643 units, are in large complexes of 50 or more. The rest is spread fairly evenly: 15,240 units in 5–9 unit buildings, 15,063 in 10–19 unit buildings and 14,812 in 20–49 unit buildings.

San Jose holds a large share of the county's apartments. Santa Clara County has 199,884 units in 5+ unit buildings, per the county ACS figures, so the city accounts for about 47% of them, and it is home to about 49% of the county's 296,206 renter households. Compared with Oakland, where 57.7% of households rent, San Jose's 44.2% renter share is lower, but its larger size means it has more renter households in total.

The median year built is 1976, and 60.4% of the city's units were built before 1980, per table B25034. Only 18.6% predate 1960, so San Jose's older stock is mostly from the 1960s and 1970s rather than the prewar era. New construction has been limited: 8.9% of units were built in 2010 or later and 1.0% in 2020 or later. That 1960s–1970s vintage is exactly the group the city's rent ordinance targets, as the next section explains.

San Jose's rent ordinance and tenant protections

San Jose regulates older apartments directly. According to the city's Tenant Protection page, the Apartment Rent Ordinance (ARO) governs rent increases on apartments in buildings of three or more units that were built and occupied before September 7, 1979. The city's landlord welcome packet says the ARO limits increases to a maximum of 5% once every 12 months. Owners of rent-stabilized apartments must update occupancy information for each unit in the city's Rent Registry every year, and buildings with ARO units pay an annual program fee collected with Code Enforcement's occupancy permit fee.

The city's Tenant Protection Ordinance requires a just cause, from a list of 13, to end a tenancy at apartment buildings with three or more units, and landlords must send a copy of any termination notice to the Housing Department within three days of serving it. A separate Ellis Act Ordinance allows owners to withdraw rent-stabilized apartments from the market, but requires notice and financial benefits for displaced tenants.

Units outside the ARO generally fall under the state Tenant Protection Act, which caps increases at 5% plus regional CPI, or 10%, whichever is lower, and exempts units with a certificate of occupancy issued within the previous 15 years. That law runs until January 1, 2030. Costa-Hawkins keeps local rent control off units with a certificate of occupancy issued after February 1, 1995.

Property and transfer taxes in Santa Clara County

Under Proposition 13, as explained by the Board of Equalization, the base tax rate is 1% of assessed value plus voter-approved bond rates, and assessed value can rise no more than 2% a year until there is a change in ownership or new construction. A sale resets the value to market. The BOE's Assessors' Handbook 401 treats the acquisition of more than 50% of an entity that owns property as a change in ownership as well. For a San Jose building held since the 1990s or earlier, the buyer's reassessed tax bill is likely to be a large step up from the seller's. The county assessor values property as of January 1, supplemental bills cover reappraisals between lien dates, and owners whose value has fallen below their Prop 13 base can seek a decline-in-value reduction or appeal during the county's filing window, which runs from July 2 to September 15 or November 30 depending on the county.

State law lets counties charge a documentary transfer tax of $0.55 per $500 of value, with cities allowed to add up to half of that. Deposits are capped at one month's rent for most landlords under Civil Code 1950.5, must be returned with an itemized statement within 21 days, and now require move-out photos; and a nonpayment notice under CCP 1161 gives three days, not counting weekends and judicial holidays.

What this means if you own a building here

If your San Jose building has three or more units and was built and occupied before September 7, 1979, a buyer will treat it as an ARO property: 5% maximum increases every 12 months, annual registry updates, program fees and just cause rules. That puts the focus on current rents and expense control rather than rapid rent growth, and buyers will price from in-place net operating income with taxes reset to the purchase price. Make sure your Rent Registry entries and program fee payments are current, since a buyer's due diligence will check them.

Use our cap rate calculator to see how your income translates to value. Skyline Capital Investments buys 5+ unit buildings across San Jose, including Downtown, North San Jose, Willow Glen and Berryessa, and including ARO buildings; our seller page explains our process.