What’s the Best City for Renters?

Many factors need to be considered when deciding where to rent a home, including costs and quality of life. With remote work now an option for more workers, how does a renter decide where to live?

A recent study by RentCafe crunched the numbers, looking at U.S. cities with at least 10,000 rental units and 50,000 residents — 149 in all — and ranking them based on 20 metrics across three weighted categories: cost of living and housing (50 percent), local economy (30 percent) and quality of life (20 percent). Brooklyn, Queens and Manhattan were treated as individual markets in the study.

For the second consecutive year, Charleston, S.C., was deemed the best U.S. city for renters. It was elevated by top-10 scores for its economy and its low cost of living, and earned plaudits for its “spacious apartments, quality schools and abundant green spaces,” according to the study. Atlanta finished second, thanks in part to its abundant job opportunities and steady income growth for renters. Scottsdale, Ariz., rounded out the top five with high marks in the economy and quality of life categories, despite a cost of living that was 13.4 percent higher than the national average.

Newark fell to the bottom of the list, ranking in the bottom 10 across all three categories. The city’s cost of living was 16 percent above the national average, and it tied with Seattle for the smallest average apartment size, at 701 square feet. Detroit, Sunnyvale, Calif., the borough of Manhattan, and Anaheim, Calif., rounded out the bottom five. Manhattan had the highest average cost of living in the study, 127 percent above the national average.

Data was sourced from the U.S. Census Bureau, other government agencies, the Cost of Living Index, other sources and RentCafe’s sister company, Yardi Matrix.

For weekly email updates on residential real estate news, sign up here.