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Disclaimer
The rent figures published on AverageRentCost.com are benchmarks from the Fair Market Rents program of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, fiscal year 2027 schedule (effective October 1, 2026 – September 30, 2027), together with median gross rents from the U.S. Census Bureau's American Community Survey 2024 1-year estimates. They describe rent levels for areas — metropolitan areas and nonmetropolitan counties — not the rent of any individual home, and not a price any landlord has offered or any tenant has agreed to pay.
What a Fair Market Rent is — and is not
A Fair Market Rent is a gross-rent figure — lease rent plus utilities — set by HUD near the 40th percentile of rents paid by recent movers in an area, for use in the Housing Choice Voucher program. Housing agencies set voucher payment standards from it, generally between 90 and 110 percent of the published figure. It is not an average of advertised rents, not a rent cap, and not a prediction: homes in every area covered here lease both above and below the FMR every month. If you are comparing a specific listing with these pages, allow for the difference between a benchmark built from survey data and a price set by one landlord on one day.
Survey medians and their limits
The Census ACS medians are estimates from a large household survey. They reflect what renter households reported paying in 2024 — including long-held leases that often sit well below current asking rents — and they carry sampling error, which is larger for smaller states. An ACS median is a good description of the typical existing rent; it is not a quote for a new lease. Where this site places an FMR and an ACS median side by side, it says so and explains why the two can differ.
Derived figures
Incomes shown under the "30% rule" are arithmetic, not advice: annual income equals the monthly gross rent multiplied by twelve and divided by 0.30. The 30% standard is a policy convention, not a personal budget recommendation; households with different debts, benefits, or priorities will land elsewhere, and nothing on this site is financial, legal, or housing advice.
Accuracy
We work to keep figures accurate — every number is taken from the published HUD or Census tables and checked before publication — but we make no warranty that the site is free of error, and we accept no liability for decisions made in reliance on it. HUD occasionally revises figures after first publication; where we find or are told of an error, we correct it and note the correction on the page. Before acting on any figure here, check the primary source at huduser.gov or census.gov.
Data vintage
The figures on this site were checked in October 2026 against the FY2027 Fair Market Rent schedule, which runs from October 1, 2026 through September 30, 2027, and the American Community Survey 2024 1-year estimates. Both series are revised on a cycle: HUD publishes a new FMR schedule each fiscal year, and the Census Bureau releases new ACS estimates each year. A figure that was accurate when checked can therefore be superseded, and the "last verified" note on each data page tells you which vintage you are reading. When a new schedule appears, pages are updated to it rather than mixed with the old one.