If you rent out residential property in California, AB 1482 — the Tenant Protection Act, codified at Civil Code § 1947.12 — sets a ceiling on how much you can raise rent each year. It took effect January 1, 2020, and it's currently written to sunset on January 1, 2030, so it governs every increase you'll issue for years to come.

The rule itself is short. The mistakes people make around it are not. Let's walk through both.

The cap: 5% plus inflation, never more than 10%

For a covered unit, the maximum annual increase is the lower of:

  • 5% plus the change in your regional CPI (the Consumer Price Index for your metro area), or
  • 10% flat.

Two other limits ride along with the percentage:

  • You can raise rent at most twice in any 12-month period, and the combined total of those increases still can't exceed the annual cap.
  • The cap is measured against the lowest rent charged in the previous 12 months — you can't briefly discount, then "raise" from the pre-discount number.

Where the 2026 number comes from

There is no single statewide percentage. Your cap is 5% plus the CPI change for your region, and the CPI figure resets every year — the April-over-April change published for your metro area applies to increases taking effect from August 1 through the following July 31. Los Angeles, the Bay Area, San Diego, and the rest of the state each get their own number, so a portfolio spanning two metros can legally have two different caps in the same month.

Before you send any increase this year, look up the current CPI figure for your specific region (the California Department of Industrial Relations and the Attorney General both publish the applicable numbers) and add it to 5%. If the sum lands above 10%, the answer is 10%. Don't reuse last year's percentage — it changes annually, and an increase that was legal in one CPI year can be an overcharge in the next.

Who's exempt — and the notice you must serve to claim it

AB 1482 doesn't cover everything. The main exemptions:

  • Newer construction. Housing issued a certificate of occupancy within the previous 15 years. Note this is a rolling window — a building exempt today ages into coverage.
  • Single-family homes and condos — but only when the owner isn't a REIT, a corporation, or an LLC with a corporate member, and only if you've given the tenant the required exemption notice in writing (Civil Code §§ 1946.2(e)(8) and 1947.12(d)(5)). Skip the notice and you don't get the exemption. This is the single most common way otherwise-exempt owners end up covered.
  • Owner-occupied duplexes where the owner lives in one of the two units.
  • Deed-restricted affordable housing.
  • Units already under stricter local rent control. AB 1482 is a floor of protection, not a ceiling — if your city's ordinance allows less than the state formula, the local number controls.

If you're claiming the single-family exemption, put the statutory language in the lease or serve it as a written notice, and keep proof. An exemption you can't document is an exemption you don't have.

The notice rules that actually catch people

Separate from the cap, Civil Code § 827(b) sets how much warning a rent increase needs:

  • Increase under 10%: at least 30 days' written notice.
  • Increase of 10% or more (measured cumulatively over the prior 12 months): at least 90 days' written notice.

Since AB 1482 caps covered units below 10% in practice, the 90-day rule mostly bites on exempt units — the single-family home where you're free to raise more than 10% still needs the long notice. Raising 12% on an exempt house with 30 days' notice is illegal even though the amount itself is fine.

A quick worked example

Say your regional CPI change is announced and it's some number C:

  • Cap = 5% + C, but never more than 10%.
  • Tenant's lowest rent in the last 12 months: $2,000.
  • Maximum new rent: $2,000 × (1 + cap).
  • If your increase is under 10%, serve at least 30 days' notice; at 10% or more (only possible on exempt units), serve 90.
  • If you already raised rent once this cycle, the second increase plus the first must stay under the same cap.

How we handle this at RentierNow

The reason we built a law registry into the platform instead of a static help article: these numbers move. The CPI component resets every year, exemptions age out on the 15-year rolling window, and local ordinances overlay the state formula. RentierNow checks proposed increases against the current AB 1482 math for the unit's location, flags the 30/90-day notice requirement, and tracks the exemption notice on file — so the increase you send is the increase the law allows.

Managing California units? See how RentierNow handles rent-cap compliance.