States With The Highest And Lowest Rent In The US For January 2024


The states with the highest rent in January 2024 are Hawaii, California, and Massachusetts according to Saturday Night Science.

States With The Highest Rent In America Map

Click to enlarge

We’ve previously taken a look at the Cheapest States and Most Expensive States, and to no one’s surprise, California was the most expensive.

But that analysis was done based on the total cost of living for food, daycare, transportation, and, of course, housing.

So today we wanted to highlight what might the most important piece of data of all those listed above — housing — and, in particular, the states with the highest rent.

In one of the few analyzes we do that does not rely on Census data, our data for this particular excercise comes from ApartmentList which releases the most timely and accurate data available on rents across the country. We specifically looked the Rental Listings –> Overall –> State data set.

After we extracted the rental data and ranked them from highest lowest, California came in a distant second to New York.

Here’s a look at the ten states in America with the highest rent:

  1. Hawaii (Rent)
  2. California (Rent)
  3. Massachusetts (Rent)
  4. New Jersey (Rent)
  5. New York (Rent)
  6. Maryland (Rent)
  7. Washington (Rent)
  8. Virginia (Rent)
  9. Colorado (Rent)
  10. Connecticut (Rent)
What state has the highest rent in America?

According to the most recent data from ApartmentList, Hawaii has the highest rent in America with a median rent of $2,203 a month.

Here’s a look at the ten states in America with the lowest rent:

  1. South Dakota (Rent)
  2. West Virginia (Rent)
  3. Arkansas (Rent)
  4. Oklahoma (Rent)
  5. Alabama (Rent)
  6. Iowa (Rent)
  7. Kentucky (Rent)
  8. Maine (Rent)
  9. Mississippi (Rent)
  10. Kansas (Rent)
What state has the lowest rent in America?

The state with the lowest rent is South Dakota with median rents of $870 a month.

Rent is generally cheaper in the Midwestern states and the South compare to the coasts. More land and less demands means lower rent.

Read on for a more detailed methodology and data on each state or feel free to check out some of other research:

How We Calculated The States With The Highest And Lowest Rent For January 2024

States With The Highest Rent In America Map

Click to enlarge

We’ve been ranking states and cities for over four years now and we always start our quests for data in the same manner — as stroll through the American Community Survey.

But, as we mentioned above, we’ve made a rate exception to that rule as there is another source we trust and that has way more timely data — ApartmentList.

ApartmentList provides monthly data on rents across America by state, select counties, and select cities. The current data runs through January 2024 — there’s a bit of a lag in reporting.

That compares to the Census last release of data in December 2023 that only goes through 2022, so ApartmentList is way more up-to-date.

With all that in mind, we took the median rent for Rental Listings –> Median Rent Overall –> State from ApartmentList’s data.

We then ranked each state from the highest median rent to the lowest.

The state with the most expensive rent ended up being Hawaii.

The best deal? South Dakota and West Virginia.

Continue on for a look at the top ten or scroll to the bottom for a detailed, state-by-state table. We also broke down every state’s data into specific charts and graphs.

We updated this article for January 2024.

The 10 States With The Highest Median Rent In America

1. Hawaii

Hawaii

Source: Wikipedia

Population: 1,450,589
Median Rent: $2,203

Detailed breakdown of rents in Hawaii.

2. California

California

Source: Wikipedia

Population: 39,356,104
Median Rent: $2,112

Detailed breakdown of rents in California.

3. Massachusetts

Massachusetts

Source: Wikipedia

Population: 6,984,205
Median Rent: $1,908

Detailed breakdown of rents in Massachusetts.

4. New Jersey

New Jersey

Source: Wikipedia

Population: 9,249,063
Median Rent: $1,880

Detailed breakdown of rents in New Jersey.

5. New York

New York

Source: Wikipedia

Population: 19,994,379
Median Rent: $1,820

Detailed breakdown of rents in New York.

6. Maryland

Maryland

Source: Wikipedia

Population: 6,161,707
Median Rent: $1,767

Detailed breakdown of rents in Maryland.

7. Washington

Washington

Source: Wikipedia

Population: 7,688,549
Median Rent: $1,700

Detailed breakdown of rents in Washington.

8. Virginia

Virginia

Source: Wikipedia

Population: 8,624,511
Median Rent: $1,659

Detailed breakdown of rents in Virginia.

9. Colorado

Colorado

Source: Wikipedia

Population: 5,770,790
Median Rent: $1,654

Detailed breakdown of rents in Colorado.

10. Connecticut

Connecticut

Source: Wikipedia

Population: 3,611,317
Median Rent: $1,577

Detailed breakdown of rents in Connecticut.

The 10 States With The Lowest Median Rent In America

1. South Dakota

South Dakota

Source: Wikipedia

Population: 890,342
Median Rent: $870

Detailed breakdown of rents in South Dakota.

2. West Virginia

West Virginia

Source: Wikipedia

Population: 1,792,967
Median Rent: $879

Detailed breakdown of rents in West Virginia.

3. Arkansas

Arkansas

Source: Wikipedia

Population: 3,018,669
Median Rent: $921

Detailed breakdown of rents in Arkansas.

4. Oklahoma

Oklahoma

Source: Wikipedia

Population: 3,970,497
Median Rent: $981

Detailed breakdown of rents in Oklahoma.

5. Alabama

Alabama

Source: Wikipedia

Population: 5,028,092
Median Rent: $984

Detailed breakdown of rents in Alabama.

6. Iowa

Iowa

Source: Wikipedia

Population: 3,188,836
Median Rent: $986

Detailed breakdown of rents in Iowa.

7. Kentucky

Kentucky

Source: Wikipedia

Population: 4,502,935
Median Rent: $1,002

Detailed breakdown of rents in Kentucky.

8. Maine

Maine

Source: Wikipedia

Population: 1,366,949
Median Rent: $1,009

Detailed breakdown of rents in Maine.

9. Mississippi

Mississippi

Source: Wikipedia

Population: 2,958,846
Median Rent: $1,011

Detailed breakdown of rents in Mississippi.

10. Kansas

Kansas

Source: Wikipedia

Population: 2,935,922
Median Rent: $1,038

Detailed breakdown of rents in Kansas.

So There Are Your States With The Highest Rents In America

With the median rent in America only $1,700, you can expect to pay almost twice that in California or New York.

The states with the highest rent in the United States are Hawaii, California, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, Maryland, Washington, Virginia, Colorado, and Connecticut.

The states with the lowest rent in the United States are South Dakota, West Virginia, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Alabama, Iowa, Kentucky, Maine, Mississippi, and Kansas.

If you’re thinking of trying to move to somewhere cheap, then stick to the heartland where you can expect to pay closer to $1,000.

For more reading, check out:

About Chris Kolmar

Chris Kolmar has been in the real estate business for almost ten years now. He originally worked for Movoto Real Estate as the director of marketing before founding HomeSnacks.

He believes the key to finding the right place to live comes down to looking at the data, reading about things to do, and, most importantly, checking it out yourself before you move.

If you've been looking for a place to live in the past several years, you've probably stumbled upon his writing already.

You can find out more about him on LinkedIn or his website.