How to value a rent concession, now that 2 in 5 listings come with one

Almost 40% of rental listings on Zillow offered some kind of concession in July 2026, according to the company's monthly rent report. The share was 39.8%, up from 35.9% a year earlier, even as typical asking rent rose 2.3% to $1,962.

A concession is anything a landlord gives you to get you to sign. It might be a free month, a few weeks off, a waived fee, or a gift card. The most common is some version of "one month free," and it can be worth more or less than it sounds depending on how it's set up.

Where concessions are most common

Zillow ties the highest shares to markets where new supply came online fastest. In July, 68.1% of listings in the Charlotte metro came with a concession, followed by Denver, Salt Lake City, Dallas, Raleigh, and Austin, all above 65%. They're rarest in tight Northeast markets. Only 8.2% of Buffalo listings offered one, along with 11.4% in Providence and 17.5% in New York.

Figures in this table are metro-wide numbers from Zillow's July 2026 report, so they won't match the city-level typical rents on our city pages.

How to turn "one month free" into a monthly rent

The number that matters is the net effective rent: what you'll actually pay over the whole lease, divided by the number of months. Take a $2,000 apartment on a 12-month lease with one month free. You pay for 11 months, or $22,000, which works out to about $1,833 a month, an 8.3% discount.

Six weeks free on a 13-month lease works out to more. You'd owe $26,000 minus $3,000, or $23,000, spread over 13 months, which comes to about $1,769 a month, an 11.5% discount. The same approach works for partial months, and our guide to calculating prorated rent walks through it.

The renewal trap

Your lease will list the full $2,000 rent, and that's the number the landlord works from at renewal. If the rent stays flat, your effective cost still jumps about 9.1%, from $1,833 to $2,000. A 3% increase on top takes it to $2,060, about 12.4% more than you were effectively paying.

That's why a lower base rent can beat a free month even when the dollar value is the same. A $2,000 apartment with one month free and a $1,833 apartment with no concession cost the same in year one, and the second one renews from a lower starting point.

It's worth asking whether the landlord will turn the concession into a lower monthly rent. Many prefer to keep the full rent on paper, but in markets where most listings carry a deal, you're in a good spot to push. We cover how to do it in negotiating your rent and at renewal time in negotiating your renewal.

Read the fine print before you sign

Check when the free month applies. Some leases take it off the first month, some spread it across the lease as a smaller monthly discount, and some apply it near the end. Many leases also include a clause that makes you pay the concession back if you break the lease early, which can turn a free month into a bill.

Our guide to understanding your lease before you sign covers what else to look for, and breaking a lease without losing your deposit covers what happens if you need to leave early.

Sources

• Zillow Research, July 2026 rent report, for concession shares and metro asking rents