U.S. Rent Price Levels Up 7.4%, Sale Prices Down 8.8%, with Minor Reversal Seen in Q1

HotPads.com, a national housing search engine, released today its comprehensive Spring Housing Report. The data looks at broad yearly data (since April 2010) and recent developments in Q1. HotPads uses a sample of one million concurrently active rental prices and four million concurrently active for sale prices to provide a detailed overview of what’s going on in the housing market. Here is what they found:

• Yearly rental listing prices are up 7.4% and for sale listing prices are down 8.8%.
• Q1 looks slightly different from yearly trend, with rental listing prices actually down 1.8% while for sale prices are up 3.5%. HotPads believes the Q1 reversal may be part of a seasonal pattern and not necessarily indicative of a broader trend.
• Increasing demand for rental properties is an indicator of a growing preference for low-risk housing options, which is closely linked to the broader economic uncertainty.
• Rent vs Buy Ratio calculations show certain states may be entering a ‘buyers’ market, including Illinois, Michigan, New York, Florida, Washington DC, and others.
• National data was calculated from the average of each state’s monthly median price weighted by the number of listings in that state.

Click here for full report and interactive charts.

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