THE SEATTLE TIMES (SEPTEMBER 8, 2018) – It’s been quite the reversal for the Seattle-area rental market, where rent growth has been near the bottom of the country in 2018 following years of rent hikes that were among the nation’s largest. Now, landlords have responded by giving out perks to lure renters.
The Seattle area is building the fifth-most apartments of any metro area in the nation right now, and the four regions building more — Dallas, Los Angeles, New York and Washington, D.C. — are all significantly larger, according to RealPage. Only Dallas appears to be building more than Seattle on a per-capita basis.
The city of Seattle has set annual records for apartment openings in recent years, though construction has lagged behind historical norms in the suburbs.
King and Snohomish counties are on pace to see 13,700 apartments open next year, the most of the current cycle, RealPage data shows. That would push the total number of new units this decade past 80,000 — the most of any decade in history, beating out the suburban-led building boom of the 1980s.
Read more at: THE SEATTLE TIMES.