Small Apartment Markets with Big Rent Increases

Some of the nation’s 100 secondary markets – those with about 25,000 to 110,000 existing units – are continuing to log significant rent increases. Of those smaller markets, 11 recorded increases in effective asking rents of greater than 3.5% in the year-ending August 2025, according to data from RealPage Market Analytics. Seven were in the Northeast region and three were in the Midwest, while the West region had one market and the South had none. At the top of the leaderboard were two Northeast markets led by Harrisburg with 5.8% annual rent growth, followed by Syracuse at 5.7%. Champaign and Providence each recorded year-over-year price increases of 5%. The lone West region market on the list, Salinas, posted annual rent growth of 4.9%. Coming in slightly above 4% were Portland (4.3%) and Flint (4.2%), while Albany recorded an annual rent increase of 4%. Year-over-year rent growth was at 3.7% in Lansing and 3.6% in Allentown and Rochester. Among the 50 largest markets nationwide, only two logged annual rent increases of more than 3.5%, with San Francisco leading the nation at 7.1% and Chicago ranking #7 nationally at 4.5%. For comparison, the U.S. overall averaged a slight decline of 0.1% in effective asking rents during the year-ending August.