The Apartment Vacancy Rate Drops

The Denver Metro Apartment Vacancy and Rent Report was released at the end of April and here are the highlights—
· The vacancy rate in the first quarter was 5.5% down, from 5.8% in the 4th quarter, and down from 5.9% in the first quarter of last year.
· Average apartment rent in the first quarter was $1543, up $33 from the 4th quarter, but only up by $8 from the first quarter of 2020.
· Median apartment rent in the first quarter was $1483, up $34 from the 4th quarter, but only up $8 from the first quarter of 2020.
· Currently there are 371k apartments in metro Denver with nearly 27k more on the way according to Apartment Insights and most of these should be finished in the next 2 years.

The fact that the vacancy rate dropped was surprising to me in light of Covid and people moving to the burbs. Second, I wonder if thousands of those new apartments that are in the planning stages may not be built until rents rise faster?