Yardi Matrix: Multifamily Rent Flat Year-Over-Year in December

(Image courtesy of Constanze Marie/pexels.com)

Yardi Matrix, Santa Barbara, Calif., noted that a weak late-year performance wiped out all rental gains made in 2025. The average U.S. advertised rent fell $5 to $1,737 in December, rendering year-over-year growth at 0%.

Month-over-month, the average U.S. advertised rent fell 0.3%.  

The last year with no annual growth in the average national advertised rent was early-pandemic 2020, and the second-most-recent was in 2010, during the recovery from the global financial crisis.

However, this follows recent years of significant growth–rents surged 22% between 2021 and 2022. And, Yardi Matrix anticipates modest increases to rent in 2026.

There were some regional variations–rent growth did occur in gateway and Midwest markets, such as New York (up 5.8% year-over-year), Chicago (up 3.6% year-over-year) and the Twin Cities (up 3.2% year-over-year).

Rent growth was negative in many Sun Belt and Western metros, such as Austin, Texas, (down 5.2%), Phoenix (down 4.1%) and Denver (down 3.9%).

By segment, lifestyle rents fell 0.3% and renter-by-necessity fell 0.2%.

The national occupancy rate fell to 94.6% from November, but remains flat year-over-year.

For single-family build-to-rent units, advertised rates fell $4 to $2,180, down 1% year-over-year. Single-family rental occupancy rates were at 94.9% in November, up 0.1% year-over-year.

Looking at the investment landscape, multifamily transaction volume increased slightly in 2025, with sales volume totaling $83.2 billion (although those aren’t final figures). That compares with $82.4 billion in 2024 and $69.5 billion in 2023.