Rents Are High, But Not Skyrocketing
Published on January 8, 2026 2:40 AM GMT
I hear people talking about "skyrocketing" rents, with the idea that
rent is going up quickly. This isn't my impression of what's
happening, and when I look at the data it's not what I see either.
Instead, rents are too high, and they were rising quickly pre-covid,
but recently they've been stable in real terms.
Here's the data I know best, the price of a 2br that I calculate on my
https://www.jefftk.com/apartment_prices/
:
The median Boston-Area rent in December 2025 was $3,350. That's up
from $2,300 in February 2013, or $3,215 in current dollars. Rent has
gone up, but just about matching inflation.
I see the same thing nationally. Here's the Consumer Price Index for
All Urban Consumers: Rent of Primary Residence in
U.S. City Average (https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/CUSR0000SEHA
),
adjusted for inflation:
Rent needs to
go down, and I'm very supportive of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/YIMBY
to remove
supply restrictions so landlords can stop making windfall profits.
But it's important to be clear-eyed about what the issue is: rent has
gone up a lot in places where there are the most jobs, then then it
has stayed high for the last decade plus.
https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/oBif3tiEKqX2wWrLE/rents-are-high-but-not-skyrocketing#comments
https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/oBif3tiEKqX2wWrLE/rents-are-high-but-not-skyrocketing