Rent prices in Atlanta climbed 2.9 percent over the past month, according to a brow-raising new report by online rental marketplace Apartment List.
Intown rents are also up nearly 19 percent since this time last year, after ten straight months of increases followed a brief decline last November, the report said.
These price hikes put the median rents in Atlanta at $1,407 for a one-bedroom and $1,416 for a two-bedroom.
Though daunting, these numbers pale in comparison to those in other metro Atlanta communities, such as Roswell, which saw rent prices soar 4.3 percent in the last month, and Alpharetta, which witnessed a 5.2-percent spike.
In Alpharetta, the median rent price for a two-bedroom apartment is $2,160 — up 37 percent since this time last year — making the North Fulton city the most expensive for renters in the state.
In fact, right now, “Atlanta proper has the least expensive rents in the Atlanta metro,” per the report.
It’s important to note, though, that the average rent in town is considerably higher than the median — the middle point in the data.
Research published today by Zumper, another rental marketplace, shows that a typical one-bedroom apartment in Atlanta rents for more than $1,700, while a standard two-bedroom could demand more than $2,200 monthly.
Nationwide, rents have increased by an average of 15.1 percent, although, in Georgia, they’ve gone up by an average of 22.7 percent.
These data points underscore the need for more affordable housing in Atlanta, which is estimated to lose around 1,500 affordable units annually, according to advocacy group HouseATL.
Atlanta’s next generation of leadership will be saddled with the weighty responsibility of combating a housing affordability crisis that has gripped the city for years.
The new mayor and their city council are poised to determine how to develop hundreds of acres of development-ripe city land — in a way that bolsters our affordable housing stock — and reimagine a zoning code that’s for years restricted how much housing we can build and where.
Check out Atlanta Civic Circle’s election guide here, and read or listen to our interviews on housing with some of the top mayoral hopefuls:
Leave a comment