This came in via email:
Hi Brutus,
As the weather gets warmer, the rental market seems to be cooling down for a change, as detailed in our April Rent Report, which now covers 250 cities. Yes, the average US rent has gained $2 M-o-M reaching $1,314, according to Yardi Matrix, but we’re also looking at a 2% increase Y-o-Y — the slowest annual rent growth rate in more than three years!
Now that we got that out of the way, let’s dive into more city-specific data:
- San Francisco, the king of California rents and runner-up for the highest rent in the country after Manhattan, actually saw the biggest Y-o-Y drop in the nation for the third month in a row, decreasing 3.6% over the year.
- And it’s not just Cali that’s seeing warmer months, Texas also comes on strong with 4 cities among the slowest growing rental markets. The first one is (no surprises here) Corpus Christi, already a regular on our list, boasting a 2.1% drop at an average rent of $954. The newcomers are ever so eager to follow in its footsteps: McAllen saw a 1.6% decrease and Pearland and El Paso each posted a 1.1% drop.
- The Lone Star State is a steal for anyone coming from California, New York, or Florida, with local rental prices in April as low as $698 in Killeen and $701 in Brownsville, which rank as the 4th and 5th most affordable cities in the US, after Wichita, Toledo, and Tulsa.
“ We expect rent growth to moderate in the coming months but it’s not so much a weakening of the apartment sector; it’s more a stabilization and shifting of focus from primary to secondary and tertiary markets, mostly due to a combination of factors, including modest economic growth, ongoing political uncertainty, and a record number of new apartments entering the nation’s tightest markets”, says Yardi Matrix senior analyst Doug Ressler when discussing the slowdown in national rent growth.
You can find out many more interesting facts from our full report and eye-grabbing infographics here:
Do you think this is something that your readers would like to know more about?
Looking forward to hearing your thoughts on this.
Best,
Ioana
Ioana Popovici
Marketing Communications Specialist | RENTCafé
ioana.rentcafe@Yardi.com | http://www.rentcafe.com
RENTCafé is a nationwide apartment search website and a part of Yardi. Our original research, insights, and in-depth analysis of the real estate market have been featured in major media publications across the U.S. Are you in search of ideas for your next story? Feel free to drop me a line.
elpasospeak 
The economy has been bad for years. . . .
So, the rental market is catching up ! (Lowering prices or not able to raise them with the cost of living.)
As the economy gets worse, or stays worse, people start sharing apartments and makes for less demand for their OWN individual apartments or rental homes.
With some even moving back in with parents.
Again, creating less demand for rentals.
Since EL Paso has a HUGE amount of young adults/ young families, still in the same town as their parents or relatives, they can move back home, or in with relatives . . . in about 2 hours. . . .
Unless people work for a upwardly mobile industry, that keeps their jobs moving from town to town, they should buy a house (with NO monthly Homeowner fees or monthly Condo fees) which can go up and be as devastating as higher rents !
When the VA and FHA discontinued “Assumable Mortgages” (no qualify to take over an existing VA or FHA mortgage) that REALLY killed home sales, and family net worth’s.
Before 1990 . . . . . most home sales were of Assuming existing VA and FHA mortgages. Those buyers bought the equity in homes, usually $5,000. to maybe $7-8,000. down, to get into a home and not qualify or re-qualify for a loan.
Qualifying for a mortgage loan is bogus anyway, as the country, the buyer, go thru sooooo many life changes and job and career changes, HOWEVER they qualified is moot.
Qualifying for a mortgage loan is a brief snapshot of the financial loan worthiness of the buyer.
After that, everything changes.
I am still here. YET, ALL of the mortgage companies that have sold or transferred MY home mortgage to . . . are OUT OF BUSINESS !
Flakes !
Over the last 30 years. . . MY home mortgage has been sold to about 10 different mortgage companies, as they go out of business, one after another.
(Maybe there should be a clause in the ORIGINAL MORTGAGE, that if THEY go out of business, the Original Loan no longer exists ???)
Oh, sure, I’M expected, no matter what, no matter the wars, the economy and 6 different Presidents, to keep making payments, but THEY can go out of business. . .ANYTIME THEY WANT ! Flakes !
You see, when you first GET a mortgage loan, you shop around and PICK, select, (sometimes for months) a mortgage company or bank based on several things.
Hometown of mortgage company, maybe a local bank, ease to make payments, bank size (financial assets), the people that work there (friends or family members), trust, and reputation.
BUT. . . after that, they can SELL/ transfer/ your mortgage to ANY SOB BANK, that has ALMOST NO ASSETS, with the most hateful employees, that is 4000 miles away and with NO LOCAL BRANCHES, with NO SAY-SO or approval from YOU AT ALL !
How do you like that ???
YOU agree to do this and do that and pay this and pay that, BASED on HOW and WHY you selected your original mortgage company/ bank.
And yet THEY can COMPLETELY disregard your Contract with the Original Mortgage Company.
MAYBE. . . .You don’t want or would have NEVER taken a loan from bank or mortgage company that supports and donates to Bernie Sanders ???
Maybe you dont and would have NEVER taken a loan with a company that supports abortion ???
Maybe you would not take a loan from a company that discriminates, based on religious/ color/ sexual/ preferences ???
Or the president of the bank belongs to the KKK ???
Yet, you can get transferred there, without your approval.
Your loan is sold like meat on a hook, to any bastardly loan company in the US.
THAT, has GOT to STOP !
If THEY cannot stay in business 30 years, WHY would they expect YOU to stay in business 30 years ???
That’s why I say . .. If THEY cant fulfill THEIR part of the contract, they should just VOID the Original Loan.
Now, back to our regularly scheduled program . . .::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
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An alternate view is that El Paso is a somewhat unusual market in that a) a lot of it’s housing stock is NOT in apartments and b) a lot of it’s rental properties don’t go through easily track-able avenues.
So is it really shocking that some of the cheap cardboard cookie-cutter apartments (especially the ones that were mass produced a few years back when we were rolling in BRAC related money at Ft Bliss) are suffering slight drops in occupancy (1% is not that much) when people here have the legitimate option to rent a duplex or a house of their own? I know folks who just made the call to move into a house so that they could have a yard and outside space of their own and that’s pretty much par for the course here. You live in an apartment for a while then you get a duplex or a house then maybe you think about buying a house. You know, stuff that hardly anyone can afford to do in San Francisco.
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