That can happen because of a new subway station, a hot new employer nearby, or simply because money appeared in their pockets.
If money were no object, more people would live in high COL areas, not fewer. You know this is true because you see it in the prices.
To prevent rent increases you’d need people all to have $n appeared in their pockets and to have a pact not to then spend $n to upgrade their living arrangements. The cruel irony of course being if everyone attempts to upgrade, then no one achieves an upgrade but they do achieve spending their new money!
UBI, which any realistic method of implementing makes a shift in income from somewhere higher on the income spectrum to somewhere lower (the exact shift being defined by the UBI level and financing mechanism), most likely (if it replaces existing means tested welfare programs) most favoring a level somewhere above where current welfare programs start tapering off, does have some predictable price effects, but they aren't “all rents go up by an amount equal to the UBI amount times the number of recipients typically living in similar units”.
First order, they are some price increases across goods and services disproportionately demanded by the group benefitting in net, with some price decreases across those disproportionately demanded by the group paying in net. These will vary by elasticity, but in total should effect some (but less than total) compression of the time money shift, reducing somewhat the real cost to those paying and the real benefit to those receiving, but with less effect on those paying because of lower marginal propensity to spend with higher income.
Beyond first order is more complicated because you have to work through demand changes,and supply chnages caused by labor market changes from reduced economic coercion, increased labor market mobility and ability to retrain for more-preferred jobs, which are going to decreased supply for some jobs, increase supply for others (though on different schedules), etc.
The only landlords who can afford to operate this way own many, many units. A long term tenant who pays in a predictable manner and isn't actively damaging property is worth their weight in gold, and you can't afford to roll the dice on the next tenant unless you're able to spread the risk and cost of the churn around.
No matter whether you're the 40th percentile (a vacancy-sensitive landlord) on price or the 90th (a vacancy-insensitive landlord), the dollar value of the underlying distribution is defined by the market's willingness and ability to pay. If that goes up, the entire distribution moves to the right.
The assumption that all rents, everywhere, would go up by the amount of UBI is the definition of "arbitrary."
When minimum wage rises, yes rents rise.
When high paying employers come to an area, yes rents rise.
These are a lot more random/diffuse in the market than UBI is, but they still cause the same effect.
Can you please explain why rents go up at all?
What does it matter?
You're claiming landlords have the ability to set rents directly based on a tenant's income.
Rents can rise based on minimum wage, but all renters do not raise their rents precisely by the increase in minimum wage.
And when high paying employers come to an area, not all renters raise rents accordingly.
You're ignoring that market forces exist affecting rent other than the simple greed of landlords. Not every landlord would increase rent by the amount of UBI because there is an obvious market opportunity in not doing so, and because not every property could justify that, even with UBI.
Most of the plans I've seen taper off and then become a tax at certain income levels.
the prices are going up because the landlords have entered a web2.0 mediated cartel.
