Rent prices are soaring as Americans flock back to cities
Lauren Campos opened the door to her Phoenix apartment last week to find a note stuck in the door frame. Her rent was going up nearly $400 a month, the note said, a 33 percent increase.
Campos and her fiancee read the letter in shock. The property management company gave them four days to decide whether to commit to stay or leave by the end of July. They spent the rest of the day poring over apartment listings online, only to realize they would either have to move or downsize from their two-bedroom place to a one-bedroom.
“It almost feels like there is nowhere to go. It’s just insane everywhere,” said Campos, 28, a lifelong Phoenix resident who has noticed a growing number of California license plates in her complex’s parking lot. “It feels like I’m being chased out of my own home, and it’s the worst feeling in the world.”
Rents are starting to surge in many parts of the country as the economy reopens and young people return rapidly to cities. On top of the influx of millennials and Gen Z renters coming back after staying with family or friends, people who can work from anywhere are still relocating to lower-cost cities, and the hot home sale market has caused some baby boomers to sell their family homes and rent again now that their kids are grown.
Nationwide, rent prices are up 7.5 percent so far this year, three times higher than normal, according to data from Apartments.com. Analysts expect rent prices to keep climbing for the foreseeable future, a major burden for renters and a warning sign that higher inflation could linger far longer than the White House and Federal Reserve keep predicting.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2021/07/09/rent-prices-rising/
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