{"id":390874,"date":"2026-07-08T17:57:08","date_gmt":"2026-07-08T17:57:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/390874\/"},"modified":"2026-07-08T17:57:08","modified_gmt":"2026-07-08T17:57:08","slug":"the-hottest-rental-markets-in-the-us-2026","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/390874\/","title":{"rendered":"The Hottest Rental Markets in the US 2026"},"content":{"rendered":"

Buying a home doesn’t make sense for everyone<\/a>, but in several highly sought-after markets<\/a>, it might be harder to rent.<\/p>\n

Regions like the Sun Belt have experienced a construction boom<\/a>, and, in turn, a drop in prices due to more inventory \u2014 but for coastal cities, that hasn’t quite been the case.<\/p>\n

“The US built more new units in 2024 than any year in the past half-century, but that boom largely bypassed the Northeast and coastal California, which is exactly why rental competition there is so intense,” Zillow senior economist Kara Ng said.<\/p>\n

Zillow ranked the hottest rental markets heading into the summer by looking at metros where rents increased quickly, vacancies dropped, and rental concessions \u2014 like waived fees or a month free off the rent \u2014 were rarely offered.<\/p>\n

It shouldn’t come as a surprise that big cities like New York<\/a> and San Francisco<\/a> are regularly the busiest rental markets in the country; vacancies are low, and rents are climbing<\/a>. However, Zillow found that<\/a> one Northeastern city with a population that’s roughly 2% of New York City’s took the cake for hottest market: Providence, Rhode Island.<\/p>\n

“In Zillow’s hottest rental markets, the math is simple: More people want to live there than there are homes to rent \u2014 whether for access to amenities, strong job markets or family ties, renters are competing over a limited supply,” Ng said.<\/p>\n

Providence, Rhode Island, a city with a population of about 195,000, is small, and its size plays a factor in its ranking. It’s recently been labeled an unaffordable place<\/a> to buy a home, mainly due to its lack of housing inventory, which, in turn, can drive up rental prices<\/a>. Providence also has the lowest share of concessions in the top 10.<\/p>\n

Read below to see the top 10 hottest markets for renters, according to Zillow.<\/p>\n

10. San Jose, CA<\/p>\n

\"Downtown<\/p>\n

San Jose.<\/p>\n

f11photo\/Getty Images <\/p>\n

Annual rent growth: 4.1%<\/p>\n

Share of concessions: 40.3%<\/p>\n

Vacancy rate forecast: 4.9%<\/p>\n

9. Virginia Beach, VA<\/p>\n

\"Oceanfront<\/p>\n

Virginia Beach, Virginia.<\/p>\n

Chansak Joe\/Getty Images <\/p>\n

Annual rent growth: 4.8%<\/p>\n

Share of concessions: 28.8%<\/p>\n

Vacancy rate forecast: 4.1%<\/p>\n

8. Milwaukee, WI<\/p>\n

\"The<\/p>\n

Milwaukee.<\/p>\n

Art Wager\/Getty Images <\/p>\n

Annual rent growth: 4.1%<\/p>\n

Share of concessions: 27.5%<\/p>\n

Vacancy rate forecast: 3.8%<\/p>\n

7. Boston, MA<\/p>\n

\"Brick<\/p>\n

Boston.<\/p>\n

Vadym Terelyuk\/Getty Images <\/p>\n

Annual rent growth: 2.5%<\/p>\n

Share of concessions: 29.7%<\/p>\n

Vacancy rate forecast: 6.3%<\/p>\n

6. Chicago, IL<\/p>\n

\"The<\/p>\n

Chicago.<\/p>\n

Jeremy Poland\/Getty Images <\/p>\n

Annual rent growth: 5.7%<\/p>\n

Share of concessions: 22.4%<\/p>\n

Vacancy rate forecast: 5.3%<\/p>\n

5. Los Angeles, CA<\/p>\n

\"Downtown<\/p>\n

Los Angeles.<\/p>\n

Tverdohlib\/Getty Images <\/p>\n

Annual rent growth: 2.4%<\/p>\n

Share of concessions: 29.4%<\/p>\n

Vacancy rate forecast: 4.5%<\/p>\n

4. Hartford, CT<\/p>\n

\"Aerial<\/p>\n

Hartford, Connecticut.<\/p>\n

Michael Warren\/Getty Images <\/p>\n

Annual rent growth: 3.9%<\/p>\n

Share of concessions: 22.3%<\/p>\n

Vacancy rate forecast: 4.3%<\/p>\n

3. San Francisco, CA<\/p>\n

\"Aerial<\/p>\n

San Francisco.<\/p>\n

Comezora\/Getty Images <\/p>\n

Annual rent growth: 5.4%<\/p>\n

Share of concessions: 33.2%<\/p>\n

Vacancy rate forecast: 4.3%<\/p>\n

2. New York, NY<\/p>\n

\"Aerial<\/p>\n

New York.<\/p>\n

Francesco Riccardo Iacomino\/Getty Images <\/p>\n

Annual rent growth: 4.5%<\/p>\n

Share of concessions: 17.8%<\/p>\n

Vacancy rate forecast: 4.3%<\/p>\n

1. Providence, RI<\/p>\n

\"Downtown<\/p>\n

Providence, Rhode Island.<\/p>\n

DenisTangneyJr\/Getty Images <\/p>\n

Annual rent growth: 5%<\/p>\n

Share of concessions: 12.9%<\/p>\n

Vacancy rate forecast: 5.1%<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Buying a home doesn’t make sense for everyone, but in several highly sought-after markets, it might be harder…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":390875,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[47314,4444,82831,1073,157349,4694,1929,56920,1010,75431,556,101,103,102,104,106,105,1181,157350,11665],"class_list":["post-390874","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-francisco","tag-big-city","tag-construction-boom","tag-family-tie","tag-home","tag-hot-market","tag-new-york","tag-price","tag-providence","tag-rent","tag-renter","tag-rhode-island","tag-san-francisco","tag-san-francisco-headlines","tag-san-francisco-news","tag-sf","tag-sf-headlines","tag-sf-news","tag-us","tag-vacancy","tag-zillow"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/390874","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=390874"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/390874\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/390875"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=390874"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=390874"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=390874"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}