Is it a renter's market? It depends on where you live

Standing with her boyfriend, Carson McDonald, on June 4, Chloe Troub believes it's insulting to say it's a renter's market given the sheer cost of rent. At least, it looked that way from the texts showing up on Mason Comans' phone a few months ago when he was apartment hunting. One property manager wrote that they were offering one month of free rent. "I even saw some places doing three months, three and a half months free," Comans said. This is what a renter's market looks like, said Zillow senior economist Kara Ng: "Renters, this is your year." The typical asking price for rent nationally is now rising slower than wages and inflation — 1.9% year over year in April, according to Zillow. By contrast, the latest inflation report, in May, showed that consumer prices more broadly were up 4.2% compared with a year ago. Figures from Realtor.com say rent has actually gone down 1.5% year over year. And Ng added that a record 39.8% of rentals on Zillow offered move-in incentives in April, from waived fees to a month or more of free rent.