The Palm Springs Coachella Valley area of Southern California has been hurt tremendously by the real estate and credit crisis meltdown. Cities like Palm Desert, Cathedral City, Rancho Mirage, Desert Hot Springs, Indian Wells, Indio, Coachella, Thermal, Yucca Valley, Joshua Tree, Twentynine Palms, Salton City and of course, Palm Springs have all seen construction of new homes virtually grind to a halt after years of over-building.

It doesn't take a Palm Desert real estate lawyer or a Palm Springs Realtor to know there is a problem. Just in early October 2008, the area's biggest Realtor in the valley announced it was closing its doors and letting all of it's agents go to other real estate agencies. There is likely to be more fallout as the real estate meltdown claims other victims in the housing industry.

But just when you thought you had heard enough about the economic crisis, the credit crisis, the real estate crisis, the foreclosure crisis or the construction crisis, and lately the real estate agent crisis, add one more as fallout from the others. A rental crisis is coming, as sure as the heat comes to the desert every summer.

The number of households looking to rent is going up every month as foreclosures take away their homes. While homes sit empty either not for rent or at rents higher than these households can afford, the demand for cheap apartments is on the rise.

What makes this a crisis, is that construction of affordable rental property is declining significantly, rents are going up, unemployment is going up, and those who are employed are seeing their real income fall. That, adds up to a crisis.

Have you seen a tent city in your town? You may have one or more, but they simply may not be on the roads you travel.

As rents go higher and renters get poorer, despite the demand for cheap rentals, landlords are likely to be faced with potential renters that either fail credit checks or whose credit scores are far lower than they would like.

Estimates of when the real estate crisis will end are now being extended farther and farther out. When it was estimated that the real estate market in California would not recover until 2009, people thought such estimates were crazy. Now experts are predicting a turn around won't occur until 2011 and no one is calling these experts crazy anymore.

This situation may have one silver lining. If demand for rental properties continue, and land values continue to decline, this may be the next area of growth for California's construction industry.

In October 2008, the U.S. Commerce Department announced that new home and apartment construction fell in September 2008 by 6.3 percent to the lowest pace since 1991. The report indicates that the housing market correction has actually gained speed in recent months as foreclosures have flooded the market.

Just when you thought you had seen the worst of the real estate crisis, it seems to have become worse again with the stock market crash. Whatever month or year people thought the real estate market would recover, we can probably push that date another six months to a year farther out and the rental crisis looming in California is likely to loom even larger.

If you have a landlord-tenant, construction law, real estate or mortgage issue in Orange County, San Diego, in Riverside, Palm Springs or anywhere in Southern California, we have the knowledge and resources to be your California Real Estate Lawyers, and Orange County and San Diego Construction Attorneys. For this reason, be sure to hire a California law firm with landlord-tenant, real estate and construction lawyers who can represent you from Palm Springs, Laguna, Newport and Huntington Beach, Corona del Mar, Anaheim, Irvine, La Quinta, Palm Desert, Yorba Linda, Carlsbad, San Diego, Costa Mesa, Westminster, Murrieta, to Chula Vista, and Coachella.

If you have a landlord-tenant, construction law or real estate legal issue, and need to know your rights, call the Law Offices of R. Sebastian Gibson, or visit our website at http://www.sebastiangibsonlaw.com  and learn how we can assist you. You can also call us to speak directly to Sebastian Gibson on the phone about your legal matter.