The number the increase is sold on
Nine percent on 120 units at 112 dollars is 10.08 dollars each, and over twelve months that is 14,515 dollars. That figure assumes nobody leaves, and it is the one that gets put in front of an owner. The page prints it, and then prints what happens once people do leave: at 6 percent of the units moving out against 3 percent who would have gone anyway, the increase is worth 13,518 dollars over the same twelve months. The churn cost about a thousand dollars of a fourteen and a half thousand dollar gain.
Break-even at 78 percent
Over twelve months a tenant who stays through the increase is worth 1,464.96 dollars. A tenant who leaves is worth 1,309 — the unit sits empty for six weeks, costs 35 dollars to turn, and then earns the 128 dollar street rate for the remaining ten and a half months. The gap between them is 155.96 dollars, which is what one move-out actually costs. Set the total against the do-nothing case and the arithmetic breaks even when 78.2 percent of the units move out, or 94 of the 120.
That is the useful output, because it does not depend on guessing how many will leave. Nobody knows that number in advance. What you can do is compare 78.2 percent against your own history of what happened the last time you sent a letter.
The horizon moves the answer more than the churn does
Run the same increase over one month and the break-even move-out share collapses to 9.2 percent, because the unit is empty for the whole period and never gets a chance to earn the higher rate back. Run it over 36 months and there is no break-even at all inside nought to a hundred percent — the increase comes out ahead even if every tenant leaves, because every vacated unit ends up on the 128 dollar street rate instead of the 112 the leaver was paying. Same increase, same churn, three completely different verdicts. Set the horizon to the period you are actually judging this over, and expect the answer to move.
Why this is not a price rise on a product
A customer who walks out of a shop takes the sale with them. A tenant who moves out leaves the unit behind. After the downtime and the turn cost, that unit is earning the current street rate from somebody else, and where the street rate sits above the increased rate — as it does at the numbers in the form — a move-out over a long horizon is a slow and expensive way of getting the unit onto the current rate card rather than a loss. That is why break-even churn in storage lands at figures that look absurd next to the same calculation for anything sold once.
Two things this page deliberately does not do. It does not tell you whether an increase is fair, justified or well timed. And it says nothing about what your rental agreement allows, what notice a rate change requires or in what form — those are set by the agreement you use and by the law of the state, and they belong with a lawyer licensed there.
Questions people ask
How many tenants can I afford to lose on a rate increase?
At the figures in the form — 120 units, 112 to 122.08 dollars, six weeks of downtime, a 128 dollar street rate and a 35 dollar turn cost over twelve months — the arithmetic breaks even at 78.2 percent moving out, which is 94 of the 120 units. That number depends heavily on the horizon and on where the street rate sits relative to the increased rate. It is arithmetic on your figures, not a recommendation to raise anything.
Why is the break-even move-out share so high?
Because a vacated storage unit is not a lost sale. It sits empty for the downtime you entered, costs the turn cost you entered, and then rents to somebody else at the street rate. When the street rate is above the increased rate, the unit ends up earning more after the move-out than before it, and only the empty period and the turn cost count against you.
Does the length of the period I look at change the answer?
More than anything else on the form. Over one month the same increase breaks even at 9.2 percent moving out, because the downtime consumes the whole period. Over 36 months there is no break-even inside nought to a hundred percent at all. The horizon is a judgement about what you are measuring, and it needs to be set deliberately.
Why does the page ask what churn I would have had anyway?
Because without it the increase gets blamed for move-outs that were going to happen regardless, and every increase then looks worse than it is. The do-nothing case on this page carries its own move-outs, with the same downtime, turn cost and backfill. Leaving that field at zero compares the increase against a facility where nobody ever leaves, which is not a comparison worth making.
How often can I raise rent on an existing storage tenant?
That is not a question this page can answer and it does not try. What a rental agreement permits, what notice a rate change requires, how it must be given and what any state statute says about it vary by state and by the agreement you use. Ask a lawyer licensed where the facility is.