Estimated read time: 2-3 minutes
- Median rent in Salt Lake City fell 6.5% to $1,476 last month.
- Salt Lake ranked fourth in rent declines, behind Austin and Tampa.
- Redfin cites increased supply and decreased demand for the rent drop.
SALT LAKE CITY — Believe it or not, the median asking rent in the Salt Lake area fell last month to $1,476, a 6.5% decline from what landlords were seeking in January 2024, according to a new analysis.
Only Austin, Texas, and Tampa, Florida, had larger declines, the nation's largest brokerage website, Redfin, reported.
In the Texas capital, the median asking rent dropped 16% year over year in January to $1,399. Back in August 2023, that number had reached a record $1,799. Tampa saw an 8.2% drop over the same 12 months, to $1,729. Another Florida city, Jacksonville, came in fourth behind the Salt Lake area, with a 6.4% drop, followed by New York, where the number was down 5%.
Last month, the Salt Lake area was ranked the nation's fourth-most affordable rental market by Redfin behind three Texas cities including Austin. December data showed Utah renters earned an estimated $64,271 in median income, nearly 9% more than the $59,040 deemed necessary to pay the $1,476 median asking rent.
Redfin's explanation for the lower rents comes down to more supply and less demand, at least for now.
"Asking rents are falling quickly in parts of Texas and Florida because those states have been building more housing than other states. Florida has also been grappling with intensifying natural disasters, which has made some people hesitant to live there," the analysis from the Seattle-based company concluded.
Rents were up in some places, with the biggest increases measured in Cincinnati, Ohio (15%), Providence, Rhode Island (13.4%), Louisville, Kentucky (10.5%), Baltimore (10.2%) and Washington, D.C. (8.8%). The analysis looked at the asking rent for newly listed apartments in buildings with at least five units in 44 of the nation's 50 most-populous metropolitan areas.
Nationwide, the median asking rent was $1,599 in January, down just 0.1% from a year earlier but up slightly, 0.5%, from December.
That could be an early signal that the downward trend in the U.S. is shifting, since the analysis warned, "rents may inch up if demand outstrips supply in a big way, which is feasible because apartment construction is slowing and high homebuying costs are fueling renter demand."
During the COVID-19 pandemic, asking rents had "skyrocketed" because there weren't enough apartments to meet the demand created by "the pandemic moving frenzy," the Redfin analysis said, so builders ramped up construction. That's now "tapering off, and demand, while strong, isn't going gangbusters like it was during the pandemic."
Redfin senior economist Sheharyar Bokhari suggested a boost in rents may be coming.
"Rental supply and demand are in lockstep, which is keeping rent growth at bay, but that may not last long," Bokhari said in a news release.
"Apartment construction could be further hampered by new tariffs on building materials," she said. "At the same time, demand for apartments continues to grow as high mortgage rates and housing prices push homeownership out of reach for many Americans. Rents will tick up if demand starts to outpace supply in a meaningful way."
