Texas continues a fairly unique feature in the apartment industry: a large percentage of units offering concessions with fairly stable occupancy rates and both quoted and effective rents continuing to climb.  Dallas often tends to lead this segment. In the past 12 months, Dallas’s occupancy rate has declined just 0.4% (the best annual showing of any of the 18 markets ALN currently surveys) to 90.5%.  Quoted Rental rates increased 3.1% to $809 per unit with Effective Rents up 2.9% to $776 per month.
 
Currently, 63.1% of all the units in the Dallas area are offering some sort of rental concession that effects annualized income.  Overall, the average concession being offered is 3.4 weeks free on a 12-month lease.  Efficiencies tend to have the fewest concessions with just over half of these units offering reductions in rents.  2 bedrooms are requiring the most at this time, with 64.0% offering an average of 3.4 weeks free on a 12 month lease.

Currently, the Plano Road/Northwest Highway area has the most concessions being offered.  Nearly 7 out of every 8 units in this submarket has some sort of concession, but they are offering an average of 2.9 weeks free, which is well below the average metro-wide.  The least percentage of concessions can be found in the Uptown/Downtown area, but these are averaging a higher-than-average 4.3 weeks free on a 12-month lease.

It is interesting to note the differences in submarkets.  There are virtually no concessions currently being offered on Efficiencies in the Lewisville/Coppell area, but in nearby Carrollton, they are offering a small concession (1.7 weeks free) on 86.1% of their efficiencies.  Keep in mind that neither of these submarkets have a particularly large number of efficiencies, however, more than 80% of the 2 bedrooms in both the Skillman/Audelia and the Plano Road/Northwest Highway area are offering concessions, but less than half of the ones in Garland, Preston/Frankford and Uptown/Downtown are currently needing these same rental concessions.  

Wayne Williams is the founder and owner of ALN Apartment Data.  ALN surveys over 2.5 million units on a monthly basis in eighteen markets including Dallas/Fort Worth, Houston, Austin, San Antonio and Corpus Christi in Texas as well as twelve metro areas in Florida, Georgia, Arizona and Nevada.  Market Surveys, Historical rending and many reports are available in each of our markets.  Wayne can be reached by emailing wayne@alnsystems.com