After a prolonged period of declines, the Manhattan rental market finally started to pick up in January with the median rent price that increased 5.7% to $3,320 year over year (YoY), even though the volume of new leases fell by 4.9% YoY. This normally means that more renewals of existing leases are happening. The vacancy rate also went down to 1.65% from 1.98% a year ago, another good sign for landlords. And the share of apartments offered with landlord concessions also went down from 49.3% to 44.5% YoY.

One factor in the uptick of the rental market is the recent weakening of the home sales market which scared a number of would-be buyers into renting instead. Manhattan rent growth eclipsed Brooklyn and Queens in January, which has not occurred since 2012.