A move-in day like no other: Tenants have a rare upper hand as apartments sit empty
Rents in Boston are down by more than 3 percent, compared with this time in 2019, according to one report.
When Ravi Munde was looking for an apartment this summer, he checked out where he used to live in the Fenway, when he was a student at Northeastern.
The monthly rent was $200 cheaper than what he paid a little more than a year ago.
Other buildings he looked at offered such incentives as $1,000 gift cards and breaks on the brokers’ fees ― just to get a tenant to sign a lease. Munde settled on an apartment at Assembly Row in Somerville. His 12-month lease included the first six weeks for free.
These are unusual times in Boston’s rental market. You might even call them unprecedented.
The coronavirus pandemic, a rapid shift to working from home, and mass confusion at the colleges and universities that drive so much of the city’s housing demand have combined to give tenants a rare upper hand over landlords.
Rents are down by more than 3 percent, compared with this time in 2019, according to one report.
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