Rental Housing Weekly Briefing: June 1-5, 2026

Subscribe

This week’s Rental Housing Weekly Briefing examines the latest multifamily rent growth data, which show increasingly uneven metro-level performance as high-supply Sun Belt markets continue to lag, alongside new Arbor-Chandan research on renter homeownership expectations, which points to persistent affordability barriers and a more difficult path from renting to owning, and the key data releases to watch in the week ahead.

LAST WEEK in RENTAL HOUSING 

Multifamily Rent Growth via Zillow's Observed Rent Index

• Multifamily rent growth remains highly uneven across the country, with local supply conditions continuing to drive a wide gap between the strongest and weakest markets. National rent growth was soft in April, but the metro-level data show that weakness is far from universal.

• The strongest annual rent growth remained concentrated across select West Coast, Northeast, and Midwest markets. Urban Honolulu led the country at 6.4% year-over-year, followed by San Francisco at 6.1%, Wichita at 6.0%, Toledo at 5.8%, and Scranton at 5.7%.

• At the other end of the distribution, several high-supply Sun Belt markets continued to post annual rent declines. Cape Coral fell 5.9% year-over-year, followed by North Port at -5.7%, Austin at -3.7%, San Antonio at -3.3%, and Tampa at -3.1%.

• The broader picture is a rental market that is no longer weakening uniformly, but remains highly fragmented. Elevated deliveries continue to weigh on several high-supply markets, while parts of the West, Northeast, and Midwest are still seeing meaningful rent gains. For operators and investors, the national average is becoming less informative than the local supply-demand balance.

Renter Homeownership Expectations

• The New York Fed’s 2026 SCE Housing Survey points to continued strain in the renter-to-owner transition. In the latest survey, 68.5% of renters said obtaining a mortgage would be somewhat or very difficult, up from 66.8% in 2025, while the “very difficult” share remained near a survey high at 44.2%.

• Affordability challenges are increasingly reaching higher-earning renters as well. Among renters earning at least $60,000 annually, the share reporting that obtaining a mortgage would be somewhat or very difficult has risen by more than 20 percentage points since 2021, reaching 58.4% in 2026. That suggests ownership barriers are no longer limited to lower-income households.

• Renters’ views of homeownership as an investment have also become more measured. In 2026, 53.6% of renters said buying property in their ZIP code would be a somewhat or very good investment, down roughly 14 percentage points over the past two years. At the same time, long-term buying expectations remain subdued, with renters reporting only a 34.7% average probability of owning a primary residence at some point in the future.

• For rental housing, the survey points to a demand environment where delayed ownership transitions may continue to support renter retention. Renters are not rejecting homeownership outright, but elevated prices, higher mortgage rates, and tighter affordability math are making the path from renting to owning more difficult.

Read the full Arbor Realty Trust-Chandan Economics analysis here.

THE WEEK AHEAD 

June 1, 2026

• Construction Spending (Census Bureau)

June 2, 2026

• Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (Bureau of Labor Statistics)

June 4, 2026

• Primary Mortgage Survey (Freddie Mac)

June 5, 2026

• Jobs Report (Bureau of Labor Statistics)