In the third quarter of 2024, the gap between apartment supply and apartment demand in the U.S. was the smallest in three years, according to a new analysis by Apartments.com. In this period, 176,000 apartments were absorbed and 178,00 were delivered. This helped to drive down vacancy rates by 10 basis points to 7.8% — the first quarterly fall since the end of 2021.

Rents, however, rose only marginally around the country and in many cases they fell. Average annual asking rent grew just 1.1%, lower than the 1.2% recorded in July. Quarter-over-quarter, rents slipped by 0.5% after rising 1% in each of the previous two quarters.

The strongest annual rent growth in the nation's top 50 markets was recorded in Washington, DC at 3.5%, followed by Richmond and Detroit at 3.4%. In contrast, annual asking rents in the Sun Belt were especially hard hit by a supply-demand imbalance. They fell by 4.7% in Austin, with smaller losses in Raleigh, Jacksonville, Phoenix and Atlanta.