Where is rental demand?

[Gene Jung]

I have been browsing many areas on Zillow to get a sense of sales vs rental. Yes, sales supply is limited in many places, but even for sales, some places seem have more listings and offering price going down (e.g. San Antonio).

However, a bigger problem is rental demand. There seems to be so much rental supply, and they are not getting rented easily. As a homeowner in OC, I have enjoyed appreciation in the past few years, but look at how there are so many rental listings:

Isn't this a hint for what's coming next? There are so many investment property owners who are only to see weak rental demand...

[Benjamin Aaker]

Zillow is a fine place to start, but shouldn't be the only source of data. Those listings really don't tell you much about the trend unless you have a spreadsheet you've been keeping secret.

For rentals, aA better thing would be to look at population and job growth in the market. Pair that with multifamily development and you can have a good idea about how the market is doing. You will have to make some estimations about future growth as any underwriter does.