Dallas/Fort Worth Metro Continues Apartment Building Spree

It’s a four-peat.

The Dallas/Fort Worth metro area apartment industry has done something the Dallas Cowboys, Dallas Mavericks, and Dallas Stars haven’t done. It’s on a four-year run of being the best.

For the fourth consecutive year, D/FW leads the nation in the projected number of apartments to be built by the end of the year, according to RENTCafé’s latest Apartment Construction Report.

You’ve seen the scaffolds and experienced the detours. D/FW is set to build 21,173 new apartments this year. The Houston metro area is fourth with 15,760 new units and Austin seventh with 11,919. By D/FW city, Dallas is expected to bring in 4,140 units, Fort Worth 3,184, and Frisco 2,356.

Dallas did experience a slowdown relative to the national trend. Dallas had a 13 percent year-over-year drop in the number of expected units.

Nationally, developers are set to bring 334,000 new apartments on the market, passing the 300K mark for the sixth consecutive year. Eight metros are expected to hit five-year highs of new apartments.

But the total is a 2.5 percent drop compared to 2020, blamed mostly on the pandemic, developers’ struggles to find qualified workers, funding, permits, or the sky-high cost of lumber.

“The pandemic shifts and resurgence of the residential rental market bring new residential supply into focus,” says Doug Ressler, Yardi Matrix manager of business intelligence. “Lack of entry-level housing supply and rising home prices will show the multi-family rental market demand increasing as new renters enter the market and Millennials extend their rental commitments.”

Methodology: Apartment projections for the year 2021 are calculated based on a Yardi Matrix proprietary algorithm, which includes confirmed and likely completions for 2021 based on the issuance of a certificate of occupancy. Apartment projections are estimates and subject to change.