So an interesting thing has been happening in various rental sectors in America: landlords are voluntarily cutting rent to keep tenants. They want to avoid going months with an empty property and nobody paying rent. In this market, vacancies are an owner’s worst enemy.

While landlords were and are still fundamentally motivated by profits and money, the means by which they go about obtaining it have changed a bit since the real estate bubble burst and unemployment levels spiked. Property owners are discovering that they cannot underestimate the bargaining power of their tenants in this economy. Tenants have become more market savvy, and in a climate where it’s slim pickings, tough going, and dog eat dog for all, more people are making demands they wouldn’t have expected themselves to a few years ago.

“I don’t think it’s any secret that the market has definitely had an adjustment over the past almost-year,” said David Wine, a vice chairman of Related. “It would be disingenuous to enter the renewal process underestimating the market knowledge of our customers. In the market that existed a year or two ago, landlords sent out the renewal notice and the resident was either happy to renew or they had to move. The process has become much more complicated.”

“The fear that’s going on among landlords is they don’t know what they’re going to do in the fall and winter,” says Marc Lewis of Century 21 NY Metro. “They can’t find enough bodies.” So to keep the tenants they have now, many are making offers.

A real estate broker at a major New York firm who is also a tenant on the Upper East Side recently received an unsolicited rent reduction of about 20 percent. “I was shocked,” she said. “It clearly said ‘your rent has been decreased.’ I just signed it and sent it back. They have a huge number of vacancies. They’re in tune with not losing tenants, and particularly not losing tenants from this area.”

Having a vacant apartment is a nightmare for landlords. In addition to losing a month or two of rent, to fill it again, the owner may have to pay the broker’s fee or give an additional month away for nothing.

Megan Noetzel, received a May 1 renewal with no reduction for a one-year lease and a very small reduction, less than 5 percent, for a two-year lease. “Given the market,” says Megan, “I knew that I had some leeway.” She wrote her landlord asking for a rent reduction of almost $400. And miraculously… she got it.

Scott Linquist, of New York, NY, was renewing his lease for August 15 when he received a pleasant surprise: a rent reduction he didn’t even ask for. Says Scott, “I love my apartment and I didn’t want to move. But had they not given me a reduction at all, I probably wouldn’t have stayed.”

Anderson Chase Financial