2022 Brookline Apartment Rental Market Report

The apartment rental market in Brookline has come roaring back in 2022. After recording all-time highs in vacancies and apartment availability during the pandemic, Brookline absorbed the supply glut at a record pace in the latter half of 2021. Now three months into 2022, the vacancy rate for Brookline apartments (0.50%) has surpassed its all-time low of 0.61% set before the pandemic in late August 2019.

Brookline Apartment Supply Numbers

Brookline’s real-time vacancy rate (RTVR) typically hits its cyclical low in late August as it does in most of Boston’s neighborhoods. The current RTVR of 0.50% is unusually low for early April, especially considering that the vacancy rate hit a record high in September of 2020 when it soared to an unprecedented 9.01%. With five months left until late August, look for Brookline’s RTVR to continue to push to new all-time lows.

The real-time availability rate (RTAR) in Brookline currently sits at 4.83%, which is slightly above the pre-pandemic RTAR in early April 2019 (4.23%). So despite the record low vacancies in Brookline, apartment availability seems to be on par with pre-COVID levels for now. That’s not bad considering that the RTAR hit an unprecedented 13.15% in April of last year.

2022 Brookline Average Rent Prices

Brookline’s current average rent price is $2,784. That is $146 less than the all-time high set in June 2020. Due to the pandemic-induced supply glut, rent prices dropped in the latter half of 2020 and stagnated throughout the first three quarters of 2020. At its low point, year-over-year rent prices in Brookline had decreased by -7.51% by April of last year. When the market began absorbing the rental supply at a rapid pace, prices began to rebound in Q4 of last year. That price growth has accelerated in the first three months of 2022.

At the current rate of price growth, it looks like Brookline’s average rent price will catch up to its previous all-time high of $2,930 by the end of the year. Despite the lower rent prices, Brookline remains the second most expensive suburb to rent an apartment behind Cambridge ($2,831). Brookline’s average rent price also currently exceeds that of Boston by $198.

Brookline 2022 Rental Market Outlook

Despite the market disruption caused by COVID-19, Brookline’s apartment rental market looks like it’s well on its way to recovery. With rent prices rebounding and apartment availability on par with pre-pandemic levels, look for rent prices to continue to climb in Brookline throughout 2022. The record low RTVR suggests that we may be headed towards a supply shortage in Brookline, which could accelerate price growth even further.

Like many other neighborhoods in Boston, Brookline is in desperate need of more rental units to meet demand. Many development projects were halted or stalled during COVID-19, putting additional pressure on the already tight supply in Brookline. Now developers are faced with rising labor and material costs due to hyper-inflation. Those additional costs will inevitably trickle down to the renter, pushing rental prices even higher in Brookline.