Both For Sale and For Rent – A Calculated Risk

In the neighborhoods where I spend any time at all, I’ve noticed two things. One is that there are a lot of places for sale these days. Another, and this is more of a surprise, is that there are a lot of signs indicating there are places for rent. (BTW – this is not just residential, I’m starting to see it for commercial places too.) I would have assumed that you see either more sales or more rentals unless people are abandoning the area. But it doesn’t seem to me – and I should note – this is purely an observation I’m making Austrian Economics style (i.e., I haven’t looked at any data) – that people are abandoning Los Angeles County, and if they are, has the exodus really increased that much in the past two months or so?

So what’s going on? Anyone have any ideas? I have a vague recollection (I’ve been so swamped lately my memory has been very feeble) of something like this being mentioned at Calculated Risk but I couldn’t find it.