Appraisal Research Counselors (ARC) is reporting that average net rents at top-tier downtown Chicago apartment buildings rose to an all-time high of $2.57 per square foot during the second quarter of this year and occupancy at those buildings reached a 6-year high. According to Chicago Real Estate Daily:
Apartment rents and occupancies have jumped the past two years as more urbanites have chosen the flexibility of renting over the burden of owning in a depressed condominium market. Many have held off on buying, worried that condo values have further to fall. Other would-be buyers can’t swing the bigger down payment or meet the tougher lending criteria of the post-housing bust era.
Yet it is the best time to buy in decades, if you look at the numbers. Soaring apartment rents and falling interest rates and condo prices favor owning over renting.
While that would normally be bad news for landlords, it isn’t yet. Tenants are “not leaving in droves” to buy condos, Mr. DeVries [of ARC] said.