Palm Beach County Sees 3-Year Streak Of Record Rental Rates In Summer Season
A review of the Palm Beach County rental statistics shows the median monthly rental rate per square foot is now a record high of $2.15 compared to $2.13 in the 2023 Summer Season.
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Has the Palm Beach County residential rental market peaked?
The early indications are the market is still growing but at a slower pace than in previous years.
The number of leases completed in Palm Beach County increased by three percent during the recently concluded 2024 Summer Buying Season, according to an analysis of statistics compiled by CondoVulturesRealty.com.
The Summer Buying Season traditionally extends from May through October when visitors and locals, alike, flee South Florida to avoid the humidity, hurricane warnings and limited number of events.
Tenants leased nearly 6,070 residential properties - apartments, condos, efficiencies multifamily units and townhouses - in Palm Beach County during the 2024 season compared to a year earlier in the 2023 season when about 5,890 places were leased.
A year earlier in the 2022 season, tenants leased nearly 4,960 residential properties in Palm Beach County.
The “Have We Peaked?” question is worth asking as the median rental rate for residence flatlined at about $2,300 monthly in the 2024 season, according to the statistics.
This was the third straight summer that the median rental rate was $2,300 monthly going back to the 2022 season.
While this monthly rental amount seems doable - and maybe even a deal - in popular areas such as Boca Raton, Delray Beach and Downtown West Palm Beach, it is much harder to see tenants paying that much to live in low-rise projects with minimal amenities and dated interiors in the western suburbs of Palm Beach County.
Prior to the pandemic, the median lease price for Palm Beach County rental properties was about $1,550 monthly in the 2019 Summer Buying Season, according to the statistics.
As Florida has become increasingly expensive, the Wall Street Journal reported on Oct. 7, 2024, that “The Great Florida Migration Is Coming Undone" as people are now leaving the state, due in part, to “hurricanes and extreme weather.”
These departures are leading to “a surplus of housing inventory and dwindling buyer interest,” according to the article.
This is an about-face from the pandemic years when a plethora of work-from-home employees relocated to South Florida from places such as California, Illinois and New York.
For context, Palm Beach County condo resales dropped by more than 24 percent during this year’s Summer Buying Season to a level of transaction activity not seen since 2010 during the Great Recession, according to a new report.
Industry watchers are at odds as to the direction of the South Florida housing market in 2025.
Bullish investors are predicting housing demand will reignite now that the Federal Reserve has begun to cut interest rates.
Bearish investors contend that home prices are too high and likely to collapse in the months ahead.
Added to this, unit owners are increasingly experiencing the headwinds - spiking special assessments and falling prices from sellers trying to unload their properties - from the looming 2025 Florida Condo Association Financial Cliff.