Buying Cheaper than Renting in two-thirds of Major Counties- but not in Ca.
There were 97 counties where renting is more affordable than buying and among the top three – where the income required to buy exceeded 50 percent – were in California. Rounding out the top five were the counties in which Seattle and Denver partially reside.
Average rental rates on 3-bedroom properties increased 3 percent from a year ago across all 285 counties analyzed, while average home prices on 3-bedroom properties increased 4 percent across those same counties.
“As home price appreciation moderates and aligns more closely with trends in rental rates, the returns in the buy-to-rent market are stabilizing and becoming more predictable – if not as lucrative as they were for investors who purchased a few years ago near the bottom of the market,” said Daren Blomquist, vice president at RealtyTrac. “Buying rentals continues to be a brilliant strategy that allows investors to hedge their bets in a real estate market shifting away from homeownership and toward a sharing economy.”
