2022 second quarter Denver Metro Apartment Vacancy and Rent Report
Researchers at the University of Denver’s Daniels College of Business in partnership with the Apartment Association of Metro Denver released the second quarter Denver Metro Apartment Vacancy and Rent report. The report shows rents continuing to increase, which is happening across the country. The average rent for the Denver metro area is $1,859.51, an increase of $93.75 from last quarter.
“The second quarter is typically the strongest quarter for rent growth,” said Ron Throupe, report author and associate professor of real estate at the Daniels College of Business. “This period is when most moves are made by families and individuals. This leads to a seasonal demand scenario and a positive rent effect of early summer with renters looking to migrate to the metro area or relocate from within.”
There was little change in the vacancy rate, 4.76% this quarter compared to 4.3% from the first quarter of 2022. The year-over-year change shows an increase of 1.1% from 3.7%.
Ron Throupe
“The 3.7% reported in 2021 was a historic low,” Throupe said. “This suggests the Denver Metro market was at ‘frictional vacancy’ levels, a measure of unit turnover with no slack in the market of available units.”
The Denver Metro apartment market added 4,006 new units to inventory this quarter resulting in a total inventory of 388,263 units. Absorption for the quarter was 2,227 units, leading to a slight uptick in vacancy.
“These results are coming off last year 2021 where a record of 19,353 net units were absorbed,” Throupe said. “There is always a concern that new unit production will outpace demand, accented by the amount of visible growth on the Front Range over the last seven years. This phenomenon has yet to occur as migration, job growth and reopening’s continue, wage increases, coupled with limited homes for sale has supported apartment demand. We will monitor for changes going forward.”
The Denver Metro Area Apartment Vacancy and Rent Survey is conducted by the University of Denver’s Daniels College of Business and Colorado Economic and Management Associates. It’s published by the Apartment Association of Metro Denver.
For interviews with Ron Throupe, please contact Kristal Griffith at kristal.griffith@du.edu. To obtain a copy of the Denver Metro Area Apartment Vacancy and Rent Survey report, please contact Christopher Dean, vice president of communications for the Apartment Association of Metro Denver, at 303.329.3300, or visit www.aamdhq.org.
How is the “The average rent for the Denver metro area” calculated? Is this for apartments only or does it include single family homes? Lastly, how does sqft and/or number of bedrooms factor into the calculation? Is that number ave. rent per room or property? Looking forward to your feedback, thank you.
Hi Jon, Ron Throupe explains that this is for apartments only. Single family homes is a separate survey. They report for the general results average rent per unit. Within the analysis we report the rent per square ft. The survey does segment units into studio. 1br, 2br and 3br. These splits along with market area segments are in the full report distributed by the Apartment Association of Metro Denver. Do be careful when using average results, there is a wide variation in rents for newer vs older properties.