ATLANTA — Good news for renters across metro Atlanta -- rental rates are on the way down, showing a slight decrease of late.

According to Rent.com, the average rent in December 2023 was $1,617. That’s just about 4.5% less than during the same time in 2022.

Rohan Ganduri is a finance professor at Emory University. He said one of the reasons we’re seeing a decline has to do with bureaucracy.

“There’s always a lag between when the demand picks up and when the permits for some of these units are given out and when the construction starts,” Ganduri said.

Ganduri said the slight dip in rental prices can also be traced back – in part to the pandemic but says several things would have to happen for rental prices to drop.

“You’ll see more and more demand for buying homes, which will take away from the demand in the rental market, which will lead to prices going down," Ganduri said. "Again, if the supply of rental properties increases, that is going to push the rental prices down."

Community housing advocate Ron Shakir said he hopes rent continues to fall because many people have been forced out of communities due to lack of affordability.

“I think it’s a market correction, and it needed to be. I think we underestimated the housing community that lived in public housing what kind of asset they were to the city,” Shakir said.

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