Seattle area's apartment pipeline is drying up
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The number of new apartment projects approved in the Seattle area has dropped significantly in recent months, which means rent hikes could be coming, real estate experts warn.
The big picture: A wave of newly built apartments helped curb rent increases over the past few years — but for many renters, that break may be ending, Axios' Sami Sparber writes.
By the numbers: From April 2024 to March 2025, developers in the Seattle metro area received permits to build 21.2 multifamily units per 10,000 residents, according to a Redfin analysis of Census Bureau data.
- That's a more than 50% drop from the annual average across those same months from 2020–2023, which was 42.6 units per 10,000 people.
- It also marks a slowdown from the pre-pandemic years (2014–2020), when an average of 37.2 units were permitted annually per 10,000 residents.
What they're saying: The permitting drop "tells me that this increase in rent is coming on the horizon," Daryl Fairweather, chief economist at Redfin, told Axios, which "is just going to hurt renters."
- Fairweather said higher interest rates and tariff impacts are raising costs for builders, making it more difficult for multifamily housing projects to pencil out.
- With the recent tech slowdown in Seattle, there's also less demand for new apartment units here than there was during the tech hiring boom of the 2010s, she said.
Zoom in: Elliott Krivenko, senior director of market analytics with CoStar, a real estate data company, told Axios that there are fewer than 15,000 market-rate apartment units currently under construction in the Seattle area, down from a high of about 30,000 units in 2023.
- In the metro area, we "haven't seen construction activity this slow since 2014," Krivenko wrote in an email to Axios.
- "We're still in a period of record new units being delivered to the market, but with this slowdown in active construction, that is about to change."
Between the lines: Seattle city officials say they've taken steps to cut red tape for builders, including by requiring fewer projects to go through design review, a process that can draw out the permitting process.
- But the Master Builders Association of King and Snohomish counties says additional reforms are needed — particularly to help reduce the cost of building townhomes, which can be a more affordable option for buyers.
What we're watching: High mortgage rates — currently 6.85% for a 30-year fixed-rate mortgage — are making it harder for people to buy homes, keeping more people in the rental market, Fairweather said.
- "That will, over time, push up rents," because more people will be competing for fewer vacant units, she said.
The bottom line: "Right now, there is a lull" in rent growth nationally and in Seattle, Fairweather said, "but it probably is not going to last."
Go deeper: New laws aim to boost housing across Washington state