Says here that apartments in the DFW are filling up faster than in recent memory -- and, accordingly, local rents in the area are on the rise as well, up to an average of $724 per month. "It's the best we've done in quite awhile," says Greg Willett, vice president of M/PF YieldStar, who tracks the local apartment market. And the area suburbs are doing exceptionally well, with many multifamily units near 95-percent occupancy:
Richardson's 9,000 units are 96.1% leased; Lewisville's 21,000 apartments are 96% filled. Dallas' Uptown, totaling 13,000 units, has hit 93.6% occupancy; Las Colinas' 23,000 apartments, 94.9%; and West Plano's 27,000 units, 95.7%. Northeast Tarrant County appears to be the leader on the western side of the metroplex, with its 6,600 units at 96.9% occupancy.Also of note: All those old apartment complexes you see coming down around town -- "mostly 1980s product in good locations and nearly all redevelopment candidates," report GlobeSt.com -- will yield some 13,000 new apartments by the middle of next year. In related news, my cousin just moved to Dallas and into the Village, and she asked me a couple of weeks ago why there were so many people crowded around the pool on a Wednesday afternoon. "Don't you people work?" she asked. Um ... no. --Robert Wilonsky
