AUSTIN, Texas — If you rent in Austin, the report probably does not surprise you. Rent in the Capital City was up 35% from January 2021 to January 2022. Portland, Oregon, is the only city that saw a steeper increase.
The painful news is part of a new report from Redfin. Average Austin rent in January 2022 was $2,245.
Average rents across the U.S. increased by 15.2% year over year to $1,891, which marks the largest jump since February 2020, the report states.
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The national median mortgage rate increased 25% to $1,595 during the same period.
Rent in Portland increased a whopping 39% year over year. Austin was followed by Newark, New Jersey, which saw a 33% increase, and Nassau County, New York, also at 33%.
The only metro areas identified in the report as having seen rents decrease are Kansas City, Missouri, and Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
“Moving right now is expensive, whether you’re renting or buying,” said Redfin Chief Economist Daryl Fairweather. “One of the only ways to avoid high housing costs is to move somewhere cheaper, but the list of places that are truly inexpensive is shrinking. Rising mortgage rates are squeezing more Americans out of the for-sale market, which will likely put increasing pressure on rents in the coming months.”
Texas has no rent control, and many Austin renters, priced out of the market, have fled for the suburbs or elsewhere. Housing advocates say those increases are contributing to Austin’s homelessness problem.