US Multifamily Rents Slip in September; Year-Over-Year Growth Cools to 0.6%

The US multifamily rental market softened in September, Multi-Housing News reported (10-7-25), citing Yardi Matrix’s latest survey. The average advertised asking rent fell $6 to $1,750, while annual growth eased to 0.6%, down 30 basis points. It was the weakest September since 2009 and the poorest monthly performance since 2022.

The build-to-rent segment also cooled, with advertised rates down $15 to $2,194, unchanged from a year earlier.

Among Yardi Matrix’s top 30 metros, growth and declines were evenly split. New York led rent gains at 4.8% year-over-year, followed by Chicago (3.9%), the Twin Cities (3.4%), and San Francisco (3.3%). Markets with abundant new supply—Denver (-4.3%), Austin (-4.0%), and Las Vegas (-2.0%)—continued to see rent declines.

National occupancy held steady at 94.7% in August, unchanged year-over-year. Atlanta posted the largest gain, up 80 basis points, while Denver slipped 40 basis points.

According to Harvard’s Joint Center for Real Estate Studies, household growth—a key driver of multifamily demand—is expected to moderate to roughly 860,000 per year over the next decade, down from about 1.5 million annually in the previous decade. However, slower homebuying could cushion the impact on rental demand.