The St. Louis Rams are moving to Los Angeles! And that means a "53-man roster, plus coaches, assistant coaches … 100-plus people looking for homes" before the season starts in the fall, a local real estate agent tells the LA Times. And that means a real estate bonanza. Sort of. Even though high-end brokerage The Agency is staffing up to accommodate all those pro athletes, they're far more likely to rent, seeing as how the average NFL career only lasts about three years, and commissions on rentals are nothing compared to what these guys make on multi-million-dollar buying and selling. (Plus the average house in LA costs roughly three times the average house in St. Louis.)
But these agents are in it for the long game: they figure they rent out an apartment in Westwood to a player now, and maybe a couple years down the line, they're helping that guy buy a $5 million house in Manhattan Beach. (The lowest-paid players make $435,000 a year, incidentally.) To that end, the Agency is planning on "helping players hire moving companies, [having] cars shipped across the country and [researching] local schools."
About that Manhattan Beach thing: pro sports players love it for whatever reason, and it's relatively close to the Rams' future stadium in Inglewood. But the players are more likely to live near their training facility, considering that's where they practice every day, and the fact that they get seriously fined for lateness. The Rams haven't decided where they'll practice yet, but they're looking in Westlake Village and Long Beach, meaning they could cluster either in the Valley (Calabasas?) or the South Bay and Orange County.
· L.A. real estate agents scramble for athletes as Rams touch down [LAT]
· BREAKING: The Rams Are Coming Back to Los Angeles, and the Chargers Might Join Them [Curbed LA]
· Take a Good Look Around Los Angeles's Future NFL Stadium [Curbed LA]