How to rent a nice house/condo at 25-50 percent discount (or more).
Over the next several years there will be excellent opportunities to rent nice homes/condos for 25-50 percent discount (or more). The reason is because there are currently millions of empty homes that will need to be occupied, plus people are downsizing (by force through foreclosures or by choice) into smaller places - people are moving from 3-4 bedroom places into 1-2 bedroom places. That creates huge net over-supply of extra rooms (if you want to look at it this way).The key to getting big rent discount is what's called "occupancy rates". You need occupancy rate to go down (meaning there are more empty, non-rented apartments) before apartment complexes start lowering rents. You can either call around and ask about occupancy rates or just find out if nice complexes in nice areas are offering free first month rent or other incentives. If they offer incentives, then you know they have empty apartments that are not renting and you may be in a position to ask for 25% discount on rent. You will probably not get a discounted rent at your current place; so you'll need to move to get a better deal. You may also get a better deal from a small landlord than from a large apartment management company. Don't be discouraged if you can't get discounted rent quickly. Apartments complexes hate lowering rent, but once occupancy rate stays down for a while, they will; they don't have a choice - discounted rent is better than an empty apartment that they know will stay empty.
Right now there is a short-term trend in some cities where people are being foreclosed on and they try to move into smaller apartments in nice areas. So in some cities occupancy rates in nice complexes are not decreasing at this time; so you will not get a discount in those cases. But that spike in demand for apartments is a very short-term trend. All these empty houses that were being foreclosed on will have to be rented out to someone; as soon as they start being offered for rent they start competing with apartment complexes and depressing rental prices.
With small "accidental landlords" there are ways to get an even bigger discount, particularly if you come across as very stable/trustworthy and you are flexible with when you can move.
Right now there are millions of homes/condos owned by "investors" that are empty. These owners are now stuck - they can not sell the place while the prices are falling. The owners are hoping for a rebound in prices in the near future. These stuck owners also don't want to be landlords (in short because being a landlord is not a game for amateurs, and these stuck owners understand it). The last thing these owners want to do is rent to bad tenants who will trash the place or become problem tenants in other ways.
So that's your starting point. You need to find these stuck owners (your best bet is the people you know and their friends, friends of friends, etc). Then you tell them that having a really good tenant is much better than having an empty home.
Then tell them that you will only pay say $500/month, but you will be a perfect tenant, you will be 100% hassle-free, and you will vacate the place at a very short notice (if they sell it, rent it to someone for more money, or for any other reason). You may even want to tell them that you'll keep the place looking really nice for prospective buyers and that you'll help them show the place.
Make it sound like you are providing them a service by occupying the empty house (having an empty house is not a safe thing to do) and helping them showcase it. Right now you can rent nice oceanfront condos in Florida that normally rent for $2,000+/month for the cost of the monthly condo fee. Similar opportunities will soon be available in other states that have lots of empty homes/condos.
Getting a nice place for $500/month may require some luck. But getting a nice $2,000/month place for $1,000/month is very doable. "Accidental landlords" are really scared of bad tenants and they don't want to deal with hassles related to renting out the place.