Job growth in the country’s largest metros is losing steam and the list of markets driving what remains of the expansion has been quietly but decisively reshuffled, according to new analysis from RealPage of Bureau of Labor Statistics data through November 2025.
For investors used to underwriting around a familiar cadre of high-growth gateways and Sun Belt magnets, the latest figures point to a more fragmented demand story, with fewer outsized winners and a longer tail of markets delivering modest but still meaningful employment gains.
RealPage’s list of the top 10 markets for absolute job creation totaled 263,700 new positions for the year ending November 2025, down from 297,200 in the same markets a year earlier and 309,900 in the year ending October.
The shift is not just about magnitude; only New York–White Plains/Kiryas Joel–Poughkeepsie, Houston–Pasadena–The Woodlands and Phoenix–Mesa–Chandler appear in both the current top 10 and the list from a year ago, highlighting how quickly the composition of growth markets has turned over.
Former stalwarts such as Dallas, Washington, DC, Los Angeles, Austin and Atlanta dropped out of the top 10 for job creation, replaced by markets including Philadelphia, Charlotte, Nashville, Tampa and Raleigh/Durham, according to RealPage.
Outside of New York, last year’s top 10 markets typically added between 25,000 and 60,000 jobs each. This November, the comparable range was closer, from 15,000 to 40,000, with New York’s 60,400 new jobs coming in at roughly half of its year-earlier total.
New York Still on Top, With a Thinner Field
Despite that halving of its pace, New York remains the single largest contributor to job growth nationally in RealPage’s analysis, anchoring a top 10 list that is more geographically diverse and notably heavier in the Northeast, Mid-Atlantic and upper Midwest. Texas, by contrast, appears only via Houston, a stark departure from its usual multi-market presence among the country’s biggest job creators.
Even as some observers question whether the historic relationship between job gains and apartment demand has weakened in the post-COVID environment, RealPage’s numbers suggest the linkage remains relevant at the metro level.
Nine of the top 10 job-creation markets are also among the top 20 markets for apartment absorption in 2025, with Minneapolis the lone outlier at number 22 for demand, while traditional demand leaders such as Dallas, Atlanta, Austin and Orlando continue to post strong leasing even as their job growth slows.
Second Tier Softens; Losses Widen
The cooling is not confined to the headline metros. RealPage reports that markets ranked 11 through 20 for job creation saw combined gains fall 22.1% from a year earlier, to 120,900 new jobs, reinforcing the notion of broad but orderly deceleration rather than a narrow slowdown at the very top.
Across the entire RealPage universe of 150 major markets, none added 100,000 or more jobs in the year ending November, with only New York clearing the 50,000 threshold.
At the same time, outright job losses are becoming more common. Thirty-one of the 150 metros tracked recorded annual declines in employment as of November, up by two from October, led by Washington, DC, where RealPage attributes the weakness in part to federal funding-related cutbacks.
Among larger markets, continued losses are evident in the Bay Area and Portland, as well as Milwaukee, Virginia Beach and Boston, signaling a less forgiving backdrop for rent growth and occupancy in those metros absent offsetting structural drivers.
Smaller Markets Lead on Growth Rates
While large metros still dominate in terms of absolute job additions, RealPage’s ranking of markets by percentage growth in employment tells a different story, with state capitals, college towns and resort-oriented economies at the forefront.
Six markets from the August list of top percentage gainers reappeared in November, pointing to some persistence in the profile of smaller, diversified economies that are benefiting from a mix of institutional employment, tourism and corporate anchors.
Fayetteville–Springdale–Rogers, Arkansas, led the November growth-rate rankings, supported by employers such as Walmart, Tyson Foods, J.B. Hunt Transportation and Simmons Foods, which together give the market a broader base than its college-town label suggests, RealPage notes.
Myrtle Beach followed closely with 3.7% annual job growth, while Salem, Oregon and Charlotte each improved their growth rates by more than 100 basis points compared with a year earlier and College Station held steady at number five.
A Broader But Shallower Pool of Outperformers
Further down the table, Wilmington, North Carolina and Jackson, Mississippi, tied for sixth place at 2% job growth, with McAllen/Brownsville, Texas and Springfield, Illinois, matching each other at 1.9%, followed by Charleston, South Carolina, at 1.7%. RealPage reports that eight of the top 10 job-growth markets posted faster growth than a year earlier, led by Myrtle Beach, which saw a 250-basis-point increase in its rate.
Beyond the top 10, a group of markets including Nashville, Honolulu, Raleigh/Durham, Boise and Asheville recorded growth between 1.5% and 1.7%, and in total 68 metros exceeded the national not seasonally adjusted employment growth rate of 0.48%.
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