Posts Tagged ‘ cheap austin apartment ’

Is your lease coming up for renewal? 

You’re in luck!  There hasn’t been a rental market like this since the early part of 2000, and that’s longer than most can remember.  Apartments and houses, anything for rent, is cheaper than it has been in a long time!  The only certainty seems to be that nobody is immune from the market’s ”resetting”.

I’ve heard numerous agents say, “it’s a new market”.  The prices are down, the specials are tremendous, and the property might even be brand new. 

Why, you ask?  Clearly, Austin is impacted by the national economic slowdown, but we’re both insulated and behind the curve, and we’re called “the first city to recover”!   Our falling rental market is explained with the economic models of supply and demand.  Supply has seen a run-up with new properties all over town, with the 78701 zip code seeing the biggest increase.  Any time we have an abundance of properties coming to market, it takes a bit to absorb.  Add to that the national slowdown, and you have a stagnating effect.  Demand has been affected by a national slowdown. Locally, our impact has been felt through a range of industries, from the car dealerships and the computer processor chip manufacturers like AMD, all the way down their supply chains.  They aren’t bringing people in from out of state at the pace they were in the past, and Austin’s growth has ratcheted down from a geiser to a common water feature.

When will it correct?  September is commonly a slower month for Austin’s real estate rental market.  School is in session, and all of the students have settled in for the semester.  Labor day follows, and nobody is thinking about moving, yet.  Typically, the first 2-3 weeks in September are great times for vacations for agents.  This year, you could take off September and October and not have missed much.  November has given us some hope, with ringing phones and leads from out-of-town relocation, but we’re not out of the woods yet.

The great deals for the prospective tenant will be good for the next 6 months, minimum, and the agents should see a vibrant early spring.  For agents, Austin apartments & houses should be on track again by mid-to-late spring, and see a return to normalcy by May, as far as volume of buissiness.  The high apartment prices of 2007 and 2008 won’t return for at least a year or two.

We’re keeping our fingers crossed!