The Flight to Affordability: Effects of Pandemic Rent Increases on Renters By Geography

In the pandemic era, people moved from high-density, expensive areas to more affordable areas, putting upward pressure on local housing prices. We examine the geographic distribution of rent growth during this time and its effects on renters. We use administrative new lease data from RealPage and household-level data on rent and income from the American Community Survey. We analyze rents and incomes using Public Use Microdata Areas grouped in two ways: by prepandemic rent levels and by pre-pandemic rent-to-income ratios. Rents grew more in areas with lower pre-pandemic rents but not in areas with lower rent-to-income ratios, consistent with higher-income remote workers moving away from high rent areas to more affordable areas. Lower-income households experienced larger increases in rent relative to their income compared to the median renter. However, area-level rent-to-income ratios reflect both compositional changes in renter populations from mobility and changes in local rents. We highlight the need for future work to track affordability for the same households over time to fully understand pandemic era affordability trends.