Job Creation Still Pushes Apartment Demand in Some Markets

While the correlation between job gains and apartment demand or rent growth has certainly weakened in the past several years, there is still some merit to the belief that job creation leads to more housing demand.

RealPage’s list of top 20 markets for annual apartment absorption or demand in the year-ending 1st quarter 2025 includes all of the top 10 markets for job creation according to March’s data release from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

The top three markets for job gains – New York, Dallas and Houston – appear as the top three for demand as well. However, after the first three, only Washington, DC appears in the top 10 for both lists, with the remaining six top job creators appearing somewhere among the #11 to #20 for annual absorption, perhaps indicating that weakening relationship. The work from anywhere trend and industry makeup of new jobs could be dampening the formerly strong relationship between jobs and housing demand in many markets.

Turning just to job creation, nine of last month’s top 10 markets returned to the list in March with New York again on top and Dallas replacing Houston at #2. Both New York and Houston saw a decrease in annual employment gains in March from February’s total, but Dallas increased by almost 5,000 jobs.

Orlando returned in the #4 spot, gaining 30,100 jobs for the year, almost even with their total last month. Washington, DC jumped from #9 in February to #5 in March but improved by only 1,800 jobs. Charlotte moved up one spot to #6 and saw a similar increase in employment gains as DC.

Philadelphia slipped to #7, just ahead of returning #8 Miami, but both experienced smaller total job gains for the year compared to last month. San Antonio and Raleigh/Durham rounded out the top 10 with gains of about 20,300 each. Raleigh/Durham replaced Chicago on this month’s top 10 list as the Windy City fell to #15 in March.

Together, the top 10 markets added 322,100 jobs in the year-ending March, about 111,000 less than the same 10 markets last March (down 25.7%). Additionally, the next 10 markets (#11 to #20) of RealPage’s top job gain markets saw their total gains decrease 30.1% from last year to total 159,600 new jobs.

Metro level job gains continue to slow as no markets exceeded 100,000 jobs gained for the year again and only New York gained between 50,000 and 99,999 jobs. The remaining top 10 markets were the only ones gaining 20,000 jobs or more for the year. Thirty-one of our top 150 markets reported annual job losses for the year, one less than last month. Job losses continued in all of California’s major markets except San Diego and Riverside-San Bernardino. Additionally, Phoenix, Boston, Denver and Baltimore experienced mild-to-moderate job losses for the year-ending March.

Job Growth

Unlike the top job gain markets, which tend to be large in population and employment, smaller markets usually dominate the top markets for annual percentage change in employment. As we typically see, state capitals, college towns and resort cities dominate this list. Eight of February’s top markets for job change returned in March.

Gainesville, FL leapt to the #1 spot for job growth in March, improving their percentage increase by 180 basis points (bps) from last month. Myrtle Beach, Charleston and College Station remained among the top 10 and also improved their employment growth by 10 to 70 bps from February.

Salinas, CA and Boise, ID tied for #5 with 2.8% job growth, but Salinas increased 40 bps from last month while Boise slipped out of the #1 spot by decreasing 50 bps. Fayetteville, AR and Fresno, CA tied at #7, just behind Salinas and Boise, with 2.7% growth, while Salem, OR’s job growth remained almost unchanged. Columbia, SC (college town and state capital) rounded out the top 10 with 2.4% job growth, up 60 bps from last month.

Outside of the top 10 growth markets, Orlando, Raleigh/Durham, Charlotte and San Antonio had employment growth rates between 1.7% and 2.0%. Including the top 10, a total of 47 markets exceeded the national not seasonally adjusted growth rate of 1.2%, two less than last month.

This post is part of a series by RealPage Senior Real Estate Economist Chuck Ehmann analyzing employment data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. For more on this data, read previous posts on Job Growth.