Waller, Weeks, and Johnson Rental Index
Keeping an eye on overvalued rental markets.
In the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic, rental rates across the United States have soared to record highs. To help demonstrate the rise in rents, the interactive tools on this page rank the most overvalued rental markets from among the nation’s largest metropolitan areas.
Past leasing data from Zillow's Observed Rent Index (ZORI) is used to model the rental trend for each measured metro. The data shows where rents should be (based on a history of rents) compared with actual, current rents. This premium or discount is defined as the percentage difference between statistically modeled prices and actual rental prices. Actual average rent, statistically predicted rent, month-over-month (M-O-M) change in rent, and year-over-year (Y-O-Y) change in rent for each metro are provided as well.
This ongoing, monthly reported project is co-produced by:
Florida Gulf Coast University
Lucas Institute for Real Estate Development & Finance
University of Alabama
Alabama Center of Real Estate
University of Mississippi
Ole Miss Real Estate Initiative
What are rent burdened households?
- The Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) defines cost-burdened (aka rent burdened) househoulds as those “who pay more than 30% of their income for housing, including utilities, and may have difficulty affording necessities such as food, clothing, transportation, or medical care.”
- The rent burdened values below represent the minimum annual household income needed to not be considered rent burdened.
- Due to significant variation across the country in utilities, we calculate our measures of rent burdened without utilities.
- Thus, our estimates of needed annual income for the two measures is conservative, implying even larger annual levels to avoid being classified in these unaffordable housing categories.
Sorting Note:
To sort data, click on the title of any column in each table.
Download Data Note:
Use the "Download Data" button for each table to download a single workbook containing
the current data and charts.
