This past quarter, we saw a continued increase in national resident satisfaction, with 77.8% of residents reporting “Good” or “Excellent” satisfaction with their renting experience. This increase marks the highest resident satisfaction since 2011 Q2 and continues the upward trend that began in the final quarter of 2017.

Continuing the national trend, renter satisfaction increased last quarter in all but one of the top 12 markets. Denver was knocked from the top improvement spot this quarter by Dallas with a 3.1 percentage point increase from this time last year. Denver was in a close second with a 2.6 percentage point increase, followed less closely by Boston with a 1.4 percentage point increase.

Atlanta was the only market to see a decrease in satisfaction this quarter; just a slight decrease of 0.1 percentage points. Boston, Chicago, and New York have the highest satisfaction levels of the top 12 markets. All three cities have satisfaction scores above 80%.

Continued Increase in National and Market-Level Renewal Intentions

Resident renewal intentions have jumped up again this quarter to 54.9%. This jump marks a five-year high for residents’ renewal intentions.

All but one of the top 12 markets matched this jump with increases ranging from 0.7 percentage points in Boston to a high of 6.8 percentage points in Miami.

Washington, D.C, on the other hand, saw continued decreases to match last quarter with a year-over-year decrease of 8.2 percentage points. This is unsurprising, as value for amount paid is still low for the District and the large number of apartments absorbed into the market recently are still affecting renewal intentions as we discussed last quarter.

Boston continues to top the other markets for renewal intentions at 62.7%. This city has been at the top for renewal intentions since the third quarter of 2017 and above 60% since 2017 Q1. New York follows closest behind with 59.3% of residents likely to renew.

Renewal decision factors of residents this past quarter generally match what we have seen in previous quarters except nearly all factors have decreased in importance from this time last year. For residents unlikely to renew, their biggest decision factor is still rental rate with 53.9% of renters citing its influence on their decision. This influence has dropped slightly since this time last year, while the influence of community management has risen by 2 percentage points from 30.4% in 2017 to 32.4% this past quarter.

Community management is the only renewal factor for those unlikely to renew that has seen a year-over-year increase. For those likely to renew, location is still the most important decision factor with 71.3% of residents citing it. Interestingly, the percentage of residents saying that it is “too much trouble to move” has increased to 21.5% from 19.6% this time last year. It is the only factor that has increased in influence for residents likely to renew.

Residents’ Value for Amount Paid Hits Six-Year High; Dallas Scores Increase the Most

National value for amount paid saw another huge jump this past quarter to 59.3%. This marks a 1.9 percentage point increase from last quarter (57.4%) and an unprecedented 4.9 percentage point increase from this time last year (54.4%). Residents’ value for amount paid is now well above 2013 levels, and the highest it has been since the first quarter of 2012.

At the market level, we saw increases in value for amount paid for all markets except Washington, D.C. Atlanta leads the pack with a score of 66.6%. Boston follows closely behind at 64.9%. The largest year-over-year increases were seen in San Francisco, Dallas, and Miami with increases of 8.4, 7.6, and 7.3 percentage points, respectively. Both San Francisco and Miami also had the largest year-over-year increases last quarter.

Dallas saw the second largest increase in year-over-year value for amount paid from 56.0% in the third quarter of 2017 to 63.5% this past quarter – a total increase of 7.6 percentage points.

Dallas is also third overall for resident satisfaction with value for amount paid. This is coupled with a comparatively mild increase of 3.4 percentage points in renewal intentions. Both of these increases can likely be attributed to an increase in the apartment supply in Dallas that is driving rents down in some parts of the city and resulting in only a 1.2% increase in rent across the entire Dallas-Fort Worth region.

Unlike what we discussed with Washington, D.C. last quarter, the increase in available apartments is not being absorbed to the same degree so it’s driving value for amount paid up instead of down.

The scores for all three questions increased relatively significantly this past quarter.

Increased Influence of Online Reviews During the Apartment Search Process

In this past quarter, 61.9% of residents said that online ratings and reviews were high or very high priority for their most recent lease decision. This is up 3.3 percentage points since this time last year. This increase in priority is to be expected, especially when paired with data from the NMHC / Kingsley Associates 2017 Renter Preferences Study that was conducted last summer. The NMHC / Kingsley Associates Renter Preference Study found that 62.8% of renters said that they had visited an apartment opinion site during their most recent apartment search.

Similarly, 68.9% of residents reported that they had referenced apartment listing sites. Most importantly, of the residents who said they had visited an apartment opinion site, 72.2% said that the reviews they saw on the apartment opinion site stopped them from visiting a community. Not only are resident reviews a high priority for a majority of renters, but online reviews can stop prospects from visiting a community all together.

According to our trend data for this past quarter, the top websites that residents reference during their apartment search are Google, Apartments.com and the community website itself.

Despite the prevalence of residents using online reviews, only a small handful of residents are posting reviews. Only 30% of residents this past quarter reported that they had posted a review to a review website. The majority of residents are looking at review sites without posting to them.

Of the websites residents said they posted to, the top three are the community’s website, Yelp, and Facebook. Google and Apartments.com are fourth and fifth with about 5% each of residents saying they have posted a review to the top two sites prospects visit.

To top it all off, of the residents who have posted a review, 60.8% said that their review was mostly positive in nature and only 14.3% said their review was negative. Residents who post reviews are generally posting positive reviews, but not enough residents are sharing reviews and those that are aren’t even posting them to the most popular websites.