Having dropped to a two-year low at the end of last year, the average asking rent for an apartment in Oakland has since ticked down another 3 percent to around $2,340 per month, which is nearly 12 percent lower than at the same time last year, 13 percent lower than prior to Covid, and over 20 percent below its 2016-era peak of nearly $3,000 a month, none of which should catch any plugged-in readers by surprise, despite plenty of bad data and misanalysis making the rounds.
At the same time, the number of apartments listed for rent in Oakland is still over 50 percent higher than at the same time last year, with 60 percent more studios and one-bedrooms on the market and local employment trending down, facts that aren’t “bearish” or “pessimistic” in nature, despite the rationalizations of some, but key to accurately forecasting rents, property values and development trends.
Keep in mind that our analysis of the rental markets in Oakland and San Francisco is based on over 250,000 data points going back two decades, not simply a couple of years, that we maintain, normalize and index on a monthly basis. And as always, we’ll keep you posted and actually plugged-in.
Oakland down 12% YoY, SF only down 5%. I assume this is people taking advantage of relative bargains in SF and moving across the bridge.
Why are only some of the neighborhoods in Oakland highlighted in the image? That doesn’t mean that the data only comes from those images, does it? I have always wondered about that. Thanks!
“That doesn’t mean that the data only comes from those images, does it?”
No it doesn’t and our apologies for the (ongoing) confusion, we’ll (try to) employ a better “Oakland Market” image going forward.