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Free Rent? DC Area Leads the Way When It Comes to Rental Concessions

  • September 9th 2020

by Nena Perry-Brown

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While the apartment market in some U.S. metro areas has responded to pandemic-induced soft demand by lowering rental rates, the market elsewhere is turning to concessions. And a new Zillow study identifies the DC area as one of the main places where landlords are using concessions to entice prospective renters.

Share of rental listings in DC area with concessions. Click to enlarge.

According to Zillow, 57.5% of rental listings located in the DC area included at least one concession in July compared to 27.4% of listings in July 2019. The Charlotte, North Carolina region comes second out of the 50 largest metro areas with 53% of rental listings advertising concessions.

Concessions range from an offer for free rent or parking to a waived or reduced security deposit, application fee, or broker fee to a gift card. Nationwide, the number of rental listings with concessions this year went from 16% in February to 30% in July. Nearly 91% of the concessions offered have been for free rent, with a median of six weeks free.

The study only looks at rental listings advertised on Zillow.

Thumbnail image courtesy of Ted Eytan. 

See other articles related to: concessions, dc area rental market, rental concessions, zillow

This article originally published at https://dc.urbanturf.com/articles/blog/free-rent-dc-area-leads-nationwide-in-offering-rental-concessions/17265.

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