Home · Methodology

How we build every number you see.

RentalAnalytics treats methodology as a product feature. Below is exactly how each estimate is computed, sourced, and aged.

1. Rent estimates

Every market-rent number on the site starts with the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development's Fair Market Rents (FMR) — a public dataset published annually that targets the 40th-percentile gross rent for each metro and is used to administer federal voucher programs.

We anchor on FY2024 FMR for the metro tied to a ZIP code. From there:

  • For bedroom counts 0-4, we use HUD's published value directly.
  • For 5+ bedrooms (HUD doesn't publish), we extrapolate at +18% per additional bedroom — consistent with HUD's own historical 4-to-5 BR ratios.
  • We age the figure forward to "today" using BLS CPI Shelter growth (currently ~4.6% YoY).
  • We apply a property-type multiplier: single-family +8%, townhouse +5%, condo +2%, duplex unit -3% vs. standard apartment.
  • The low/high band is ±~15% around the central estimate to reflect within-metro spread.

Each estimate ships with a confidence score (0-100). Direct ZIP matches with multiple metro ZIPs land in the 80-92 range. ZIPs outside our sample dataset fall back to the national median and get scored ~35, with a clear "extrapolated" flag.

2. Cap rate benchmarks

Benchmarks are stored in /assets/data/cap-rate-benchmarks.json by metro tier (1/2/3) and property type. The bands are estimated from:

  • CBRE U.S. Cap Rate Survey ranges (industry standard).
  • NCREIF metro tier definitions.
  • Brokerage market reports from CBRE, JLL, and Marcus & Millichap.

We classify ZIPs into Tier 1 (gateway/major metros), Tier 2 (secondary), or Tier 3 (tertiary/cash-flow). Unknown ZIPs default to Tier 2.

3. Vacancy & rent growth

Vacancy and YoY rent-growth values on city pages are estimated blends drawn from U.S. Census Housing Vacancy Survey (HVS), ApartmentList national rent reports, and Zillow Research ZORI. They are always labeled as estimated and dated to the most recent quarter.

For markets in the LandlordIQ /get_rent_growth endpoint, the forward 12-month projection is a 60/40 blend of recent metro YoY and BLS shelter CPI.

4. Regulations

Our regulation dataset is editorial summary of state and city landlord-tenant law for the top 20 U.S. cities. Each entry has a reviewed_on date. We re-review annually or when ordinances change. Plain-English summary only — not legal advice.

5. Confidence scoring

Every API response and on-page estimate includes a confidence_score field between 0 and 100. Higher means we had a direct data anchor; lower means we extrapolated or fell back to a national figure. Treat anything below 50 as a rough directional estimate, not a deal underwrite.

6. Refresh cadence

  • HUD FMR: annual (October).
  • BLS CPI Shelter: monthly.
  • Census ACS: annual (1-year and 5-year releases).
  • City metrics on this site: re-snapshotted quarterly.

7. What we don't do

  • We do not aggregate listings from Zillow, Apartments.com, Realtor.com, or the MLS. Those are first-party datasets we do not have rights to.
  • We do not provide appraisals or BPOs.
  • We do not provide legal advice — regulation summaries are starting points, not opinions.

Methodology last updated 2024-10-15. Questions: methodology@rentalanalytics.com.