Apartment Rental Rates for Cities Across the West

One of the unfortunate consequences of the mortgage foreclosure crisis scandal is the rapidly decreasing availability of rentals and increasing rents nationally. Here in the West, rents are highest in the usual suspects, such as across California and along the coast in the Pacific Northwest. The least expensive rates are in smaller urban metro areas like Boise, Colorado Springs, Albuquerque, and Tucson. Smaller cities and towns are usually less expensive than metro areas unless they are located in scenic areas or where tourism is an important local part of the economy. Widespread shortages of inexpensive affordable rentals are plaguing those tourist and scenic areas, as well as locations where rapid sudden energy development is underway. This results in high prices only adding to unaffordability.

Monthly rents average $665 in Tucson; $715 in Albuquerque; $716 in Colorado Springs; $737 in Boise; $787 in Salt Lake City; $817 in Phoenix; $$846 in Portland; $880 in Denver; $886 in Las Vegas; $962 in Sacramento; $1067 in Seattle; $1370 in San Diego; $1577 in San Francisco / Oakland; $1647 in San Jose; $1649 in Los Angeles/Orange County. Most rents increased from two to over ten percent for 2007. The outlook is for greater increases in 2008.

http://www.realfacts.com/11132007.html

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