The San Francisco rental market is still facing a sluggish recovery, which is great news for local apartment-hunters, as the median rent for a one-bedroom apartment in SF is now 3.3% lower than it was a year ago.
Some would say it’s the “Doom Loop,” others would say “Don’t threaten me with a good time.” But SocketSite reports that average rent prices are still falling in San Francisco, even as rents are rising in other cities nationwide. That information comes from the latest National Rent Report from Zumper of median rent prices for one- and two-bedroom apartments.
Rents are rising across the country and have increased substantially since the pandemic began.
— SF Examiner (@sfexaminer) March 29, 2024
San Francisco remains an exception.https://t.co/25oWySK89g
As the Examiner notes, the report found the average one-bedroom is going for $2,900 in SF, which is a 3.3% drop from what that average was in March of last year. Meanwhile, a two-bedroom apartment in SF is averaging $3,850, which is down nearly 4% from where that price was this time last year.
The numbers coming from the month of March is significant, as March is considered the end of a “slow moving season” of renters seeking apartments.
Speaking in national terms, the Zumper report says that “After the last few years of atypical rental trends, the market has returned to a more standard pattern where demand cools in the winter months and picks up again in the spring and peaks in the summer and fall.”
And this continues a couple-years-long trend that rental prices are still inching down in San Francisco, while rent prices are increasing nationwide. According to Zumper, “The national one-bedroom rent increased 0.3% to $1,487, while two-bedrooms grew 0.5% to $1,847.”
Meanwhile, San Francisco rents still remain well below their pre-pandemic levels. SocketSite points out that SF rental prices are currently down 17% from pre-pandemic levels, and down 22% since their peak in 2015.
Still, these numbers are not really cause for celebration among SF renters. The Zumper report found that San Francisco still has the third most-expensive average rent prices in the country, behind only New York City, and Jersey City, New Jersey.
Image: Joe Kukura, SFist
