Arizona Has the 3 Best Rental Markets in America, a New Study Finds. Our Data Agrees.

Arizona is having a moment with renters. The three best rental markets in the country are all in the state, according to a new analysis of 180 rental markets from the personal finance site WalletHub, reported by Realtor.com.

Scottsdale took the top spot, followed by the neighboring Phoenix suburbs of Gilbert and Chandler. WalletHub graded each market on 21 measures across rental affordability and quality of life, from rent-to-income ratios and security-deposit limits to job markets, crime, schools, and even tenant bedbug protections. In the best cities for renters, rent can cost as little as about 15% of income, analyst Chip Lupo noted in the report.

The full top 10 ran Scottsdale, Gilbert, and Chandler in Arizona, then Overland Park, Kansas; Columbia, Maryland; Peoria, Arizona; Bismarck, North Dakota; Huntsville, Alabama; Sioux Falls, South Dakota; and Amarillo, Texas.

Our data backs it up

RentDataNow measures something WalletHub does not: the Rent Reality Score, which compares a city's current rent to its own long-run trend. A high score means renters are paying below what the city's trajectory would predict, in other words, getting good value right now. The Arizona winners all score near the top. Gilbert posts an 86, Peoria an 83, and Chandler and Scottsdale each a 79. That independent read lines up neatly with WalletHub's ranking.

Affordable against strong incomes

Gilbert runs about $2,019 against a median household income near $122,551, Chandler about $1,907 on roughly $108,095, Peoria about $1,853, and Scottsdale about $2,167 on about $110,886. Chandler and Peoria sit below the national median rent of about $1,930, and even the pricier two stay a modest share of local income. Rents have also cooled: Gilbert is actually down about 1.3% over the past year, while Chandler and Scottsdale rose only in the low single digits. For the fuller picture of how the metro got here, see our look at how Phoenix rent has changed since 2021.

Where the list gets more mixed

Not every high-ranked market looks like a value on our scale. WalletHub's affordability category favored Huntsville, Alabama, at about $1,319, which also earns a strong 77 on our Rent Reality Score, and low-cost Plains markets like Bismarck and Amarillo near $1,300. But two of its top five, Columbia, Maryland (about $2,303) and Overland Park, Kansas (about $1,807), score below 50 on our value metric, meaning rents there are running above their own trend even if the quality-of-life marks are high. The takeaway: a great place to live is not always a great deal on rent, and Arizona is one of the few states scoring well on both.

Renters weighing these markets can compare any two in the RentDataNow compare tool or browse the cities renting furthest below their trend on our best-value rankings.

Sources

Study, rankings, and quotes: Realtor.com, This Sun Belt State Has Some of the Top Markets for Renters (2026), reporting a WalletHub analysis. Rent figures and the Rent Reality Score: RentDataNow, June 2026, anchored to the Zillow Observed Rent Index.