I think the increase in rental prices is going to continue for quite awhile. My recent experience moving to SF and trying to find a place was incredible. I was just looking for sublets, but most people that I got to personally meet told me their email rate for a CL ad was 150-300 emails a day. I quickly learned that unless I was discovering the ad within 2 hours of posting there was no point to even replying.

I was only able to get an apartment after (1) enlisting my mother on the East Coast to spend all her spare time on CL forwarding me appropriate listings, (2) calling an ad's phone number 22 minutes after it was posted, (3) making sure I was the very first person that was personally screened, and (4) forcing a check for two months' rent into their hand unsolicited with the message that if they found anyone better I'd just stop payment. It's a rough market and it is still getting crazier. I think someone on a previous HN comment thread mentioned the city gained only 270 new housing units last year.