If you tell everyone that you cannot increase more than 5% a year, this is used as a signal to all landlords to increase 5% a year. It's a coordination mechanism. And it helps hedge for years in which the market rent has increased by more than 5% and the landlord is unable to adjust. A commenter who is a landlord confirmed this as well.
And this will increase the incentive to build new homes. This could be good but new homes tend to be more expensive and serve the high end. Much like the median price of a new car is significantly higher than the median price of all cars on the market.
There are entire industries in New York that focus on buying units and converting them from rent stabilized/controlled to market rents through any means (direct payment, intimidation, legal, etc). To think this will somehow lower what people actually pay for housing is naive.
Landlords already charge as much as the market can bear. Coordination isn't really necessary.
This statement doesn't mean anything.
Consider a game where you try to maximize revenue. You play along with other players with the same goal. If you set your rent too high, other players undercut you. You set the price too low, you leave money on the table. Now consider a rule that says you can at most raise the prices x% a year and the same is true for all players. Now you're anchored to this increase and an equilibrium is more likely to emerge such that every participant increases prices by that amount every year. Much like a minimum wage gives a signal to employers who rely on low cost labor to pay the minimum wage allowed. If you look at distribution of wages, you'll see a huge spike at the minimum as employers essentially use that value to coordinate among themselves.
