Dwellsy’s December data report reveals 20 American cities that have experienced rapid increases in rent over the past 12 months.
Los Altos, CA (January 2023) – Across the U.S., shoppers are united in their shock at the price of eggs. In many grocery stores, they’re $4 or more per dozen – that’s over twice the amount they cost a year ago. Depending on where you live, a carton of eggs might not be the only thing leaving your budget feeling, well, scrambled. According to the latest data drop from Dwellsy, rent has also skyrocketed to mind-boggling levels in some cities.
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“With record-breaking price increases, 2022 was a roller-coaster year for most renters, regardless of location or property type,” says Jonas Bordo, CEO and cofounder of Dwellsy. “But in some cities, rent has risen by 40, 50, or even 100 percent since December 2021.”
Dwellsy, the largest home rental listing platform in the country, regularly mines its 13+ million residential rental listings for statistics and data. Because Dwellsy allows landlords to post listings free of charge, it has a pool of data that’s more diverse - and more representative of the true rental landscape - than that of pay-to-play listing services.
Each month, Dwellsy breaks down this data regionally across the U.S. so renters and landlords can see up-to-date trends in rental housing and current affordability in over 250 markets.
Bordo believes that having hard data on cities with rapidly rising rent is especially crucial for individuals and households who are considering relocating. Without this information, it can be difficult for renters to pick out developing rental trends, make informed decisions, and plan for the future.
“In order to increase the specificity of what we’re pricing and reduce the risk of noise in the underlying data, Dwellsy has recently updated our methodology for analyzing rent data,” Bordo says. “We’ve focused in on two property types: three-bedroom homes because they are by far the most common rental home type, and one-bedroom apartments because they are similar to two-bedroom apartments in terms of inventory, but are more price-accessible.”
For a more detailed look at Dwellsy’s rent price analysis methodology, see this article.
Top Ten Cities with Fastest-Growing Rent for Three-Bedroom Home Rentals
A close look at the past year’s trends reveals that as a group, single-family home rentals (SFRs) experienced greater rent increases than did apartments. From December 2021 to December 2022, asking rent for three-bedroom SFRs rose 8 percent. (Compare that to a 0.6 percent increase for one-bedroom apartments.) But even within the SFR category, some cities have experienced more dramatic rent increases than others.
Anderson, Indiana, claims to be “a city on the rise,” and that’s true in many ways—one of them being Anderson’s rent prices! In 2022, the city’s median asking rent for a three-bedroom SFR went up a staggering 48 percent, growing to $1,499 per month from just over $1,000 per month a year earlier.
“Miami is the most expensive large city on this list, with the price of a three-bedroom home rental going up 23.1 percent since December 2021,” Bordo says.
This table lists cities with the fastest growing rent for three-bedroom SFRs between December 2021 and December 2022.
| Rank | Metropolitan Statistical Area | Median December 2022 Asking Rent | Change in Rent Since December 2021 |
| 1 | Anderson, IN | $ 1,499 | + 48.0% |
| 2 | Albany, GA | $ 1,185 | + 26.1% |
| 3 | Hilton Head, SC | $ 2,638 | + 23.4% |
| 4 | Miami, FL | $ 3,200 | + 23.1% |
| 5 | Zanesville, OH | $ 1,950 | + 21.9% |
| 6 | Cape Coral-Fort Myers, FL | $ 2,245 | + 21.4% |
| 7 | Corvallis, OR | $ 2,298 | + 20.3% |
| 8 | Fort Collins-Loveland, CO | $ 2,200 | + 18.9% |
| 9 | Honolulu, HI | $ 3,500 | + 18.6% |
| 9 | New Orleans, LA | $ 1,898 | + 18.6% |
Top Ten Cities with Fastest-Growing Rent for One-Bedroom Apartment Rentals
Restaurant week is here in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, and it’s fair to assume that the topic of discussion at some meals will be rising rent. That’s because Oshkosh has far outpaced every other city in the country in this category, with rent for a one-bedroom apartment rising 103.9 percent since December 2021. Each city in the top five has experienced a rent increase of over 37 percent in the past year.
“One thing to bear in mind with this particular cohort is that apartment markets in smaller cities can be highly volatile,” says Bordo. “The delivery of just a few new buildings can have a dramatic effect. For instance, if one or two luxury apartment complexes are built in an area that previously had none, median asking rent might rise substantially.”
This table lists cities with the fastest growing rent for one-bedroom apartments between December 2021 and December 2022.
| Rank | Metropolitan Statistical Area | Median December 2022 Asking Rent | Change in Rent Since December 2021 |
| 1 | Oshkosh, WI | $ 1,425 | + 103.9% |
| 2 | Scranton, PA | $ 1,200 | + 50.0% |
| 3 | Fargo, ND | $ 826 | + 43.7% |
| 4 | Minot, ND | $ 840 | + 41.2% |
| 5 | Knoxville, TN | $ 1,095 | + 37.7% |
| 6 | Poughkeepsie-Newburgh, NY | $ 1,790 | + 32.6% |
| 7 | Zanesville, OH | $ 760 | + 32.2% |
| 8 | Albany, OR | $ 1,278 | + 28.4% |
| 9 | Charleston, SC | $ 1,338 | + 28.0% |
| 10 | Durham-Chapel Hill, NC | $ 1,314 | + 25.1% |
“If your city was on one of these lists, don’t panic - deliveries of new rental properties can shake up the rankings quite a bit from month to month,” concludes Bordo. “And even if your area is consistently expensive, it looks like we’ll be leaving the worst of the rent roller coaster behind us in 2022. I expect more stable month-over-month rent prices to continue into the coming months.”
About Jonas Bordo:
Jonas Bordo is the CEO and cofounder of Dwellsy, the free residential rental marketplace that makes it easy to find hard-to-find rentals. Prior to cofounding Dwellsy, Jonas was a senior executive at several leading real estate firms including Essex Property Trust and BentallGreenOak, and was with the Boston Consulting Group after graduating with his MBA from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business.
About Dwellsy:
Dwellsy is the renter’s marketplace: a comprehensive residential home rentals marketplace based on the radical concept that true, organic search in a free ecosystem creates more value than the pay-to-play model embraced by all of the current rental listing services.
