Southern States Led the Nationwide Increase in Rental Inventory Levels, Latest HouseCanary Report Finds

SAN FRANCISCO–(BUSINESS WIRE) -- August 7, 2024

HouseCanary, Inc. (“HouseCanary”), a national brokerage known for its innovation and accuracy of real estate information, today released its latest National Rental Report, showing that Single-Family Rental (SFR) inventory and days-on-market continue to see gradual growth, which increased at 16.7% and 15.4%, respectively. The increases in both metrics were driven by trends seen in the southern states.

Consequently and consistent with preceding reports, the stable growth seen in both inventory levels and days-on-market coupled with ongoing demand for rentals as an alternative to homebuying, the median national rent price also saw a slight increase of 2.3% compared to the previous year. 

Chris Stroud, Co-founder and Chief of Research at HouseCanary, commented: “Our latest report generated results well-within our expectations, with a spike in inventory levels and days-on-market, particularly in the southern states. While the region saw strong and increasing demand in housing due to in-migration during the pandemic and ultimately drove real estate developments, that is no longer the case at this time. Florida is the perfect case study for this as the state saw the biggest increase in pricing between 2021 - 2022, but our latest report showed the opposite trend, with the state seeing the most significant decrease in pricing in the first half of this year.”

Brandon Lwowski, Senior Director of Research at HouseCanary, added: “Furthermore, we continue to see a slight uptick in listing prices, which were up 2.3% from the same period last year. People are still choosing to rent as opposed to buying homes, in order to unshackle themselves from the long-term financial commitments of purchasing. On top of that, interest rates remain at multi-year highs, which further hinder buying capabilities. With the anticipated cutting of interest rates in the remainder of the year, we look forward to seeing how this can potentially shape the housing market in the second half of 2024.”

Following a thorough analysis of the aggregated data, HouseCanary’s report identified the following key findings about the rental market for single-family detached listings in the first half of 2024:

• Available-for-rent inventory nationwide shoots up: In H1 2024, available-for-rent inventory continued to increase 16.7% compared to the previous year. As a result, this half only saw marginal year-over-year increases in median SFR prices at just 2.3%, similar to the previous report.

• Continued inventory influx results in days-on-market surge: The average days-on-market experienced a surge of 15.4% year-over-year. The increase in days-on-market was led by southern states, coupled with the region’s increase in inventory levels. Greenville-Anderson-Mauldin, SC saw the most significant increase in days-on-market, 145.2%.

• Southern states leading the increase in inventory: The top ten MSAs that experienced the most significant increase in inventory levels were all southern states, led by Florida. The increase in inventory does not necessarily signal only a decrease in demand, but may be the result of other external factors, such as ongoing real estate developments and investments that drive supply up. 

• Florida's Ongoing Rental Rollercoaster: Six out of the top ten MSAs that experienced the largest annual decrease in listing prices were in Florida, opposite of the trends seen almost two years ago in H2 2022 when Florida MSAs experienced the highest price increases. This can potentially signal a return to historically-normal price levels in the state. 

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Additional findings can be found in the full report.

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Methodology

HouseCanary’s H1 2024 Rental Report compares insights from H1 2023 and H1 2024 to explore trends shaping the U.S. rental market for single-family detached listings, including price and supply shifts across 43 states and 153 metropolitan statistical areas (“MSAs”) with the most rental market activity. The findings in today’s report represent an aggregation and summary of all single-family detached listing records between January 2024 and June 2024.

This report is run at a quarterly cadence in order to capture the quick changes that can occur in a volatile market that has been experiencing record-level growth and prices over recent years.

While the Rental Report is a nationwide snapshot of the health of the market, detailed rental statistics are available for 153 MSAs for SFR investors looking for insights into specific markets.