Los Angeles ends strange rite of passage with new fridge law

Summary

When Gov. Gavin Newsom of California signed a new state law in October mandating landlords supply tenants with a working stove and refrigerator starting on Jan. 1, 2026, it marked the end of a bizarre rite of passage for many moving to Los Angeles.Unlike most of the country, or even many other cities in California, Los Angeles renters are often responsible for buying and installing their own refrigerators — and with removing them when they leave.This has led to a robust network of used appliance shops, Craigslist and Facebook Marketplace ads, under the table swaps between incoming and outgoing renters, landlords who rent fridges by the month and Reddit queries like, “Quick question: do LA apartments not come with refrigerators?!!.” There’s a longstanding joke that many Angelenos own their refrigerators but not their own homes.“It’s weird,” said Greg Estrada, a sales representative with The Appliance & Mattress Depot in Santa Ana, just south of Los Angeles County.Shocked is the word Alex Buckley has used. Mr. Buckley, 24, arrived in Los Angeles from Boston in 2024 to take a job as a production assistant. Then he went on a grocery run with his sister, who was there helping him move in.“She was holding a jug of milk,” said Mr. Buckley, “and she’s like, ‘Where’s your fridge?’ I was like huh? Where is the fridge?”With a pile of meat warming on the floor, he jumped in the car, went to the closest Home Depot, and bought the cheapest “real” fridge he could find, Mr. Buckley said.The one he ended up with was just five feet tall, yet still cost around $200, all he could afford after wiping out his savings on the move itself. After squeezing the fridge into his small SUV, he shoved it up his two flights of stairs.“It was maybe a foot and half wide on the inside,” said Mr. Buckley, “and the freezer fit, like, two pints of ice cream. If there had been two of us in the apartment,” it wouldn’t have been big enough.”Antonio Liranzo, 34, was also quickly introduced to the appliance ...