"Though San Diego County has seen a tighter housing market in recent months, we have not yet reached the level of our friends up north," says a new report from the San Diego County Apartment Association. The average rent for a one-bedroom apartment in San Diego County is $624, and the average for a two-bedroom apartment is $841.
However, that may be understating the problem, according to another report on the local market. For projects with 25 or more units, the average rent countywide was $943 as of Sept. 1, according to Marketpoint Realty Advisors, a real estate information service. In the North County, the average is $999.
Silicon Valley has a similarly low vacancy rate at 2%. But in the larger apartment complexes of 25 or more units, MarketPoint found that the San Diego market shrank to just 0.63% in September, despite an explosion in new dwellings because of a recent apartment construction boom.
The construction boom is relative, of course. Community resistance to apartments has generally hindered multifamily construction, even with rapidly rising single-family home prices sharpening demand for rented dwellings. Escalating development fees have also discouraged would-be apartment builders, according to the apartment association.
Vacancy rates ranged from a high of 2.03% in the North County to 1.42% and 1.43%, respectively, in the East County and in the city of San Diego. In the La Jolla submarket, vacancies are below 0.1%, while the vacancy factor was 4.7% in the more downtrodden City Heights district, according to the association.
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