Rents are plunging in the most expensive markets

[Recursion]

http://www.businessinsider.com/us-rental-market-analysis-2016-11

All heck is breaking loose in San Francisco…

But not because the economy has tanked in the most ludicrously expensive rental market in the US, which it has not. Enormous supply is flooding the market, thanks to a historic construction boom not only of apartment towers but also of condo towers, whose investor-owned units, now that selling them has become tough, are appearing on the rental market.

Nearly all of the new supply is high end, and it is pressuring the market from the top down.

The median asking rent – half are lower, half are higher – for a one-bedroom apartment fell 7.9% year-over-year to $3,380, according to Zumper, which analyzes rental data from over 1 million active rental listings in multi-family buildings (it does not include single-family houses on the rental market). For a two-bedroom, asking rent fell 6.6% year-over-year to $4,670. The fourth month in a row of year-over-year declines.

[Yavin4]

1. There are soooo many condos going up in NYC you can barely walk down the street.

We may see a collapse in the housing market in Manhattan. As new, more modern units come online, older and more expensive units will have to drop their prices in order to compete. For example, if you own an apartment that's a 4-story walk up in a nice neighborhood, you may have to lower your asking price as that new building with an elevator and a doorman is just around the corner.