How much rent has risen in 5 years: every major US city ranked
Rent in Miami Gardens, FL jumped +54.6% over the past five years — the largest increase of any large US city, versus a +28.0% typical rise nationwide.
Rents climbed across nearly every US city over the past five years, but the size of the jump varies enormously by metro. This ranking measures how much the typical rent changed from April 2021 to April 2026, using Zillow's Observed Rent Index for each city. The typical large US city saw rent rise +28.0% over the span; the 25 cities below ran far hotter.
Miami Gardens, FL leads the country, with the median rent up +54.6% — from $1,826/month in April 2021 to $2,823/month today.
| # | City | April 2021 rent | April 2026 rent | 5-year change |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Miami Gardens, FL | $1,826 | $2,823 | +54.6% |
| 2 | Columbia, MO | $946 | $1,446 | +52.9% |
| 3 | Waterbury, CT | $1,054 | $1,569 | +48.9% |
| 4 | New York, NY | $2,647 | $3,927 | +48.4% |
| 5 | Springfield, MA | $1,153 | $1,703 | +47.7% |
| 6 | Rockford, IL | $814 | $1,199 | +47.3% |
| 7 | Peoria, IL | $786 | $1,144 | +45.5% |
| 8 | Miami, FL | $2,073 | $3,012 | +45.3% |
| 9 | West Palm Beach, FL | $1,609 | $2,327 | +44.6% |
| 10 | High Point, NC | $1,004 | $1,451 | +44.5% |
| 11 | Evansville, IN | $701 | $1,013 | +44.5% |
| 12 | Bridgeport, CT | $1,463 | $2,099 | +43.5% |
| 13 | Hialeah, FL | $1,690 | $2,423 | +43.4% |
| 14 | Springfield, IL | $818 | $1,172 | +43.3% |
| 15 | Knoxville, TN | $1,207 | $1,729 | +43.2% |
| 16 | Topeka, KS | $855 | $1,224 | +43.2% |
| 17 | New Haven, CT | $1,566 | $2,240 | +43.0% |
| 18 | Charleston, SC | $1,530 | $2,186 | +42.9% |
| 19 | Hollywood, FL | $1,656 | $2,347 | +41.7% |
| 20 | Lexington, KY | $1,070 | $1,515 | +41.6% |
| 21 | Akron, OH | $802 | $1,135 | +41.5% |
| 22 | Worcester, MA | $1,542 | $2,180 | +41.4% |
| 23 | Elgin, IL | $1,290 | $1,822 | +41.2% |
| 24 | Newport News, VA | $1,128 | $1,593 | +41.2% |
| 25 | Rio Rancho, NM | $1,252 | $1,767 | +41.1% |
Key findings
- Miami Gardens, FL posted the largest 5-year rent increase of any large US city, up +54.6%.
- The typical large US city saw rent rise +28.0% over the five years — meaning every city in this top 25 outpaced the national norm by a wide margin.
- The fastest-rising markets concentrate in the Sun Belt and Mountain West, where 2020–2022 in-migration collided with limited new supply.
- A large five-year jump doesn't always mean rent is still rising — several of these cities have cooled or fallen year-over-year even as their five-year total stays high.
Why five years is the right lens
Year-over-year change captures the current moment but misses the cumulative shock renters actually feel. A city that rose 8% a year for five years looks calm month to month yet has repriced the entire market by nearly half. The five-year window spans the pandemic rent surge, the 2022 peak, and the partial cooldown since — the full arc that determines whether today's renters are paying dramatically more than the last lease cohort. Click any city to see its complete month-by-month rent history.
This study measures the percentage change in citywide median rent over a five-year window, from April 2021 to April 2026. Rent is the Zillow Observed Rent Index (ZORI), a smoothed repeat-rent index tracking the typical asking rent for the middle tier of each city's market.
The five-year start month is selected automatically as the same calendar month five years before the latest available ZORI snapshot, so the comparison always spans an even five years and refreshes as new data arrives. Only cities with a valid reading in both the start and end month are ranked.
The universe is US cities with at least 100,000 residents per the US Census ACS 5-year estimate; markets with a current rent above $20,000/month are excluded as outliers. The "typical" figure cited is the median percentage change across all eligible cities, not the mean, to limit the influence of extreme markets.
The full underlying dataset is available as a CSV for verification, republishing, or extending the analysis.
↓ how-much-rent-has-risen-in-5-years.csvThese findings and the accompanying dataset are released under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license. You are free to republish, including commercially, as long as you credit RentDataNow and link back to this page so readers can verify the underlying data.
RentDataNow Data Team (2026). "How much rent has risen in 5 years: every major US city ranked." RentDataNow. Retrieved from https://rentdatanow.com/studies/how-much-rent-has-risen-in-5-years
- ZORI (Zillow Observed Rent Index) — monthly city-level median rent back to 2015, smoothed repeat-rent methodology. Public download at zillow.com/research/data.
- US Census ACS 5-year estimates — Table B01003 (population). US Census Bureau, latest published vintage.
- RentDataNow city history pages — every row links to the full month-by-month ZORI series for that city.
RentDataNow publishes original research grounded in ZORI rent data, BLS wage data, HUD Fair Market Rents, and US Census demographics. Every study includes the underlying numbers, methodology, and sources so readers can verify or extend the analysis.
RentDataNow is an independent service and is not affiliated with, sponsored by, or endorsed by Zillow Group, Inc., the U.S. Census Bureau, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, or any government agency. ZORI (Zillow Observed Rent Index), the American Community Survey, Fair Market Rents, and other product names are trademarks of their respective owners, used here for identification only. Figures are provided "as is" without warranty of accuracy or completeness, and any reuse is at your own risk. See our Terms of Service for full terms.