Bay area rent control questions

[Kevin Crawford]

I'm considering Richmond as one of my cities to find a rental in but I have no experience with the rent control practices.  Can someone familiar with the area's laws shine some light on this.  Are all the bay areas cities with rent control the same in terms of the practices.  I know of Berkeley and Oakland have it as well.  

 This is my current understanding of it.  If I buy a property built before a certain year that currently has tenants in it, I cannot raise there current rents beyond the allowable increase for the year(3%-4%)  I would have to wait until any of the units becomes vacant to raise rents to current rent rates.

Is this correct so far?  And is there other important information I'm missing that you can share?

Thanks in advance BP community