Published in InsideRealEstateNews.com | October 29, 2012
The apartment vacancy rate in the Denver metro area fell to 4.3 percent in the third quarter, dropping to the lowest vacancy rate recorded in any quarter in a dozen years, according to a report released today by the Apartment Association of Metro Denver and the Colorado Division of Realty.
The last time the vacancy rate was lower was in the third quarter of 2000, when it stood at 3.7 percent. At that time, the average monthly rental rate was $722, or about $970 in inflation-adjusted dollars, which is not much higher than today’s average rental rate of $986.
The apartment vacancy rate was down from 2011’s third-quarter rate of 4.9 percent, and was also down from this year’s second quarter rate of 4.8 percent.
For the past 12 quarters, the vacancy rate has fallen when compared to the same quarter one year earlier. The last time the quarterly vacancy rate rose year over year was during the third quarter of 2009.
From the third quarter of 2011 to the same period of 2012, the vacancy rate dropped in Adams, Arapahoe, and Jefferson counties, and in the Boulder/Broomfield area. The vacancy rate rose in Douglas County and was flat in Denver County during the same period.
“Considering that we were already under five-percent vacancy, this additional drop is significant,” said Ron Throupe, professor of Real Estate at the Burns School of Real Estate and Construction Management at the University of Denver, the report’s author. “Rent growth hit an 11-year high during the second quarter, but there is still enough demand out there to keep filling up units.”
As vacancy rates moved down, the area’s average rent increased. During the third quarter of 2012, the average monthly rent of $986 in metro Denver is up 5.2 percent, or $49, from last year’s third-quarter average rent of $936.
The average rent rose in all counties measured except Adams County, with the largest increases found in Arapahoe County in the Boulder/Broomfield area where the average rents grew year over year by 7.1 percent and 8.1 percent, respectively. The county areas with the highest average rents were Douglas County and the Boulder/Broomfield area where the average rents were $1,140 and $1,115, respectively. Adams County reported the lowest average rent at $893.
“The average rent has grown year over year in every quarter for the past two and a half years, and it has recently begun to accelerate,” said Ryan McMaken a spokesman for the Colorado Division of Housing. “The rent growth we’re now seeing is starting to look like what we experienced in the days of the dot-com boom.”
