Rents Decline with Increased Border Security and Immigration Enforcement

You don’t need to be an economics major to understand the cause and effect of Supply and Demand. The more Demand, the less Supply–which causes prices to increase. The less Demand causes more Supply, therefore prices decrease. This common sense understanding applies to our basic needs, including housing, and there is a direct correlation between the Biden Administration’s lack of border security and immigration enforcement that caused housing and rent prices to skyrocket during Biden’s presidency.

Allowing over 10-15 million to illegally enter the country impacted housing availability and affordability in the near and long term. Yes, the pandemic also fueled a crazed housing market as people were fleeing from blue states to red states, but overall, rental prices are now falling, according to an October 2025 report by Zumper.

Additional studies, including one by the U.S. Federal Reserve cited by then-Senator J.D. Vance during his debate against Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, note the direct correlation to unmitigated immigration to the “housing crisis.”

As promised earlier tonight, here is Michelle Bowman of the Federal Reserve Board of Governors:

"Given the current low inventory of affordable housing, the inflow of new immigrants to some geographic areas could result in upward pressure on rents."https://t.co/dfO0wFmyPs pic.twitter.com/KfDjPaZC7G

— JD Vance (@JDVance) October 2, 2024

The rental study by Zumper finds that throughout Southern California and the U.S., rental prices are falling, with the only outlier being San Francisco which has risen by double digits. According to the report:

San Francisco two-bedroom rent is up 17.6% year-over-year, marking not only the sharpest increase in the nation this month but also the highest annual growth rate the city has seen since Zumper began tracking rents about a decade ago.

From the Bronx to Los Angeles to Las Vegas, rental prices are falling due to less demand and a “surge of new inventory.” The last time we checked, the Bronx and Los Angeles aren’t building new multi-family apartment complexes. In fact, developers are pulling out of Los Angeles due to increased regulations and taxes, resulting in a drop of 30 percent of new construction in three years.

According to reports, Nevada has seen an increase of 562 percent in the state’s illegal immigrant population since 2021. (emphasis added). During the four years of the Biden administration, Las Vegas rents skyrocketed, but since January of this year, they have declined by an average of three percent.

“The research literature has generally found that increases in immigration raise state and local governments’ spending — particularly on education, health care, and housing — more than their revenues,” according to a report by Numbers USA. According to FAIR US, in 2023 illegal immigration cost Nevada taxpayers an estimated $2 billion, or nearly $2,000 per Nevada household annually.

“Our greatest blunder, or our biggest misunderstanding, is not being able to understand exponential growth because it can come on so suddenly and it hits you like a ton of bricks. For example, if you’re growing by one percent a year, that’s a doubling time of 70 years. If you’re growing by two percent a year, that’s a doubling time of 35 years, and so on. So anything that grows exponentially is unsustainable in nature.

America’s own working class is disadvantaged by this and disproportionately impacting Black and Latino citizens. So, they are the ones who are hurt the most. The groups who claim that they care about these working class people? It’s a crock.” said Leon Kolankiewicz, Scientific Director for NumbersUSA.

On that note, what does a 562 percent increase in Nevada’s illegal immigrant population in a short four years do to Nevada’s housing affordability and availability? Politicians in Nevada will simply say that the Silver State has a housing crisis.

I have often said we don’t have a housing crisis, we have an immigration crisis….both legal and illegal. Now that the Trump administration is enforcing federal law at the border and within “sanctuary” jurisdictions, the overall rental market is easing due to a “surge in inventory”–which, according to numerous reports, is likely tied to over two million people self-deporting or deported by the Trump administration.