Long Island rental situation continues to be dire
A new rent report from Apartment Guide, based on data from their partners, found that nationally most apartments of all sizes have seen an increase in rent price compared to the previous year.
- Nationally, the report found that
- Studio apartments decreased in price by 1.3 percent year-over-year
- 1-bedroom apartments increased in price by 3.2 percent year-over-year
- 2-bedroom apartments increased in price by 5.3 percent year-over-year
- 3-bedroom apartments increased in price by 4.2 percent year-over-year
For Long Island, Apartment Guide only had data available for Glen Cove, Hempstead and Smithtown. In these areas, the stark year-over-year price increase compared to the rest of the nation and New York City is still noteworthy.
The reasons why Apartment Guide only had data for these areas is also telling about the rental situation on Long Island:
- Our data is based on multifamily housing (large apartment complexes) and a lot of these Long Island areas are either single-family homes or smaller apartment buildings, which not would be included in our data set.
- There just aren’t a lot of vacancies in these areas. Our data is based on available units and their current list prices.
- We only use data from our partners because we know the price data is accurate to the date.
This reaffirms Census data as well, where even in 2019 less than 20% of Long Island housing units are renter-occupied, compared to 68% for New York City and 36% nationally.
As the pandemic has encouraged more and more migration to the suburbs, the high cost and low availability of rentals on Long Island might not abate anytime soon.