vs Last Month
−0.10 pts
Continued cooling. Real-time rents predicting further decline.
U.S. National Rent Index
CPI Shelter · 12-Month % Change
4.20
%
-0.10 pts
vs. last month (4.30%)
Past 12 months
Range 4.10 – 5.00
vs Last Year-0.60
5-Yr Avg5.80%
2023 Peak8.20%
Rent inflation has cooled from 8.20% at peak to 4.20% today — but the historical norm is ~3%. A $2,000 rent at 4.20% means $84/mo more at renewal. Sun Belt markets are cooling; coastal cities still tight.
Historical trend
Monthly YoY change in CPI Shelter.
Source: FRED · CUSR0000SAH1
The long view: since 1985
Forty years of shelter inflation. 2022–23 was the worst spike.
Peak 8.20% · March 2023
Trough −0.30% · May 2010
Today 4.20%
How today stacks up
vs Last Year
−0.60 pts
Down from 4.80%. The post-COVID surge is unwinding.
5-Year Average
5.80%
Skewed by 2022–23 surge. Today below average.
Pre-COVID Norm
~3.5%
2015–2019 averaged 3.4%. Still 70 bps above that.
Use this rate
Tools for renters and owners alike.
About the U.S. National Rent Index
This tracker shows the year-over-year change in CPI Shelter (housing services), the federal government's official measure of how fast rent and owner-equivalent rent are rising nationally. It's published monthly by the Bureau of Labor Statistics as part of the broader CPI release. Shelter is the single largest component of CPI — about 34% of the total basket — which means whatever happens here disproportionately drives headline inflation.
Why CPI Shelter lags real-time rents
The BLS surveys leases on rolling six-month cycles, so the CPI Shelter measure lags real-time market rents by 6–18 months. Real-time rent indexes (Zillow ZORI, Apartment List, Redfin) showed rents accelerating in 2021 and peaking by mid-2022 — but the official CPI Shelter measure didn't peak until March 2023, almost a year later. The same lag is now working in reverse: spot-market rents have cooled meaningfully since 2023, and the official CPI Shelter reading is finally catching up.
What this means for renters
At 4.20%, a $2,000 monthly rent translates to an expected $84/month increase at lease renewal — about $1,008 more per year. Cooler markets (Sun Belt overbuilt cities like Phoenix, Austin, Tampa) are seeing flat or negative rent changes; supply-constrained markets (NYC, San Francisco, Boston) are still running 4–7%. The headline national number averages all of these. Renters in cooler markets often have real negotiating leverage for the first time in five years.
Related trackers
Other live numbers that move with — or against — this one.
Frequently asked
What this number means, and what it doesn't.
Real-time rent indexes (Zillow ZORI, Apartment List) measure asking rents on new listings — they reflect market conditions today. CPI Shelter measures all leases on a rolling six-month survey, so it includes long-term tenants whose rents haven't reset. CPI lags real-time rents by 6–18 months.
Yes — CPI Shelter includes "owners' equivalent rent" (OER), the BLS's estimate of what owners would pay to rent their own homes. OER is the single largest CPI component (~25%) and behaves similarly to actual rent.
Yes — many Sun Belt cities (Austin, Phoenix, Tampa, Jacksonville, Las Vegas) showed flat or negative rent change in 2024–25 as multifamily construction caught up with demand. Coastal supply-constrained markets and Midwest mid-tier cities remained positive.
They move loosely together but with different drivers. Rent reflects supply/demand for housing services right now. Home prices reflect rent expectations PLUS interest rates PLUS demand for ownership. Today's setup (cooling rent + sticky home prices) is unusual — typically they move in lockstep.
The Fed expects CPI Shelter to drift toward 3% by late 2026 based on the lag from cooler real-time rents. Getting all the way to 2% likely requires either a recession (demand-side cooling) or continued supply-side relief from the 2021–22 multifamily construction boom finishing delivery.
Methodology
Source
Pulled from FRED · CUSR0000SAH1 and cached on the EvvyTools server.
Update schedule
Refreshed automatically by our cron whenever the upstream source publishes a new value. Historical values are not revised after publication.
How we compute
Display value is the raw published number, unrounded. Comparison stats use the closest available reference date. We never edit the underlying data.