If you’re apartment hunting right now, your landlord may be more desperate than you think. About 40% of rentals listed on Zillow are currently dangling move-in incentives — things like a free month’s rent — driven by a construction boom that flooded certain U.S. markets with more units than renters to fill them, according to NPR.
Not everywhere, though. The surplus isn’t spread evenly across the country, and whether you’ll find a deal depends almost entirely on your ZIP code. Some metros built aggressively over the past several years; others didn’t build nearly enough. Renters in those slower-growth cities are still staring down tight supply and stubborn prices.
The gap matters. In markets where builders overshot demand, landlords are now competing for tenants — and a free month’s rent is one of the blunter tools they’re reaching for. That kind of concession can translate to hundreds or even thousands of dollars in savings over a lease term, depending on the unit’s price.
Supply-heavy markets are where the deals are. Where supply stayed constrained, renters are largely out of luck — and nothing in the Zillow data suggests that’s changing soon.
The 40% figure, reported Monday, June 16, covers only listings on Zillow’s platform and may not reflect the full rental universe, particularly in smaller cities or rural areas where the platform has thinner coverage. Whether Oklahoma’s metro markets — Oklahoma City or Tulsa — fall on the surplus or scarcity side of that divide wasn’t specified in the data released.
Reported by NPR. Read the original report.
