Apartment Occupancy Dampens in Cape Coral/Fort Myers

The sun seems to be setting on stellar performance in the Cape Coral/Fort Myers apartment market. While this small Gulf Coast market is still logging the nation’s strongest annual effective asking rent growth performance (24% as of August), Cape Coral/Fort Myers also saw one of the worst occupancy downturns in the past year (-370 bps), dragging occupancy down to 93.9%, according to data from RealPage Market Analytics. That was one of the worst showings nationwide (alongside mostly small Texas apartment markets, which have not enjoyed the solid rent increases Florida has seen). One thing dampening the apartment occupancy performance in Cape Coral/Fort Myers is the big supply volumes hitting this market in recent years. In good news, however, construction volumes are tapering off, which could provide some relief in the near term.