DALLAS — If it seems like there are apartments everywhere you look, get used to it. Apparently, we are going to need a lot more of them in the years ahead.
Right now, there are more apartment dwellers in DFW (1.3 Million of them) than anywhere else in the state. Houston has 1.2 Million, Austin has 367,400, and San Antonio has 336,000.
But make room for many more.
Just to keep up with demand, a recent report from the National Apartment Association predicts DFW will need 19,000 more units each year.
Again, that's more than any other city in Texas will need to build.
And that's saying something, because they predict Houston will need 15,000 more units each year, Austin will need 8,000 more yearly, and San Antonio will need an additional 4,000 apartments annually.
The prediction also says Texas, combined with just Florida and California, will account for 40% of all the new apartments needed nationally between now and 2035. It appears the people behind this study believe the tremendous influx of people into Texas will continue in the years ahead.
But will something be done to increase affordability?
Not that long ago, WFAA reported on how many lower-rent units have been lost over the years in DFW in favor of high-rent luxury apartments.
The analysis by the National Apartment Association confirms that's not just happening here. Compared to 2015, they found that nationwide in 2020 there were 4.7 million fewer affordable units that had rents below $1,000.
What’s driving up apartment rents?
If you rent, or want to rent, and you've found vacancies hard to come by and reasonable rent even harder to come by, there are a lot of factors to blame. A big part of the problem is so many people have moved to big Texas cities and need housing.
But in addition to all the people moving in, a lot of people are moving back in, and are adding to the short supply of units, which runs up rents.
You probably know someone who ‘consolidated a household’ during the earlier days of the pandemic, like someone who lost a job or got really lonely and moved back in with their parents.
They consolidated.
Apartmentlist.com notes that nationwide in 2020, 2.5 million households consolidated for various reasons. That left a number of homes and apartments vacant.
Well, they didn't want to live with mom and dad or whomever they consolidated with forever, so by the end of 2020, the site says those 2.5 million households ‘unconsolidated’ again–and people moved back to their own places.
On top of that, they report an additional 2 million households were created in 2021. That's put a serious crimp on the supply of places to live.
How to get an apartment if you don’t have rental history
With so much competition for apartments, what do you do if you don’t have much credit or rental history and you want to lease?
ApartmentList recently published an article addressing that concern with some tips for aspiring renters.