PORTLAND, Ore. (KOIN) — Do you feel like the walls have closed in on your Portland apartment? A new study says that may ring true for anyone who’s been renting spaces in the Rose City for the past 10 years.
According to the nationwide apartment search website RentCafe, apartments grew larger in 2020 and 2021 when many renters were working from home and searching for spaces that could fit a home office.
Now, the website reports that increasing demand for rentals has encouraged developers to build smaller units so that more can fit in an apartment building. Consequently, the “post-pandemic housing market” saw an uptick in studio and one-bedroom apartments — which made up 57% of all apartments in 2022.
“In fact, in 2022, the average apartment size was 887 square feet,” RentCafe said. “That’s 54 square feet less than 10 years ago, when rentals measured 941 square feet, on average. But, the sharpest drop in one year was in 2022, when the average size went from 917 to 887 — a difference of 30 square feet.”
Portland was among the cities leading the charge for tiny residences. It actually tied Queens, New York for No. 2 for cities with the smallest average apartment sizes.
The data shows that the average size of all apartments in Portland was 742 square feet in 2022. The average size of all apartments last year was 681 square feet, a 9% decline from 2012.
These numbers mirror the findings of a previous RentCafe study that listed Portland as one of the top 20 U.S. cities with new apartment construction. Researchers predicted that 8,500 new apartments were expected in the metro area by the end of 2022, which could explain why rentals are becoming smaller rather than growing and size.
According to RentCafe, Seattle is the only city that beat out Portland and Queens for its dwindling apartment space. Listed at No. 1, Seattle’s new apartments were 650 on average in 2022.