Median Gross Rent by U.S. State: 2024 Ranking of All 50 States

Overview: What the 2024 Rent Ranking Actually Measures

The median is the middle of the gross-rent distribution for renter-occupied housing units paying cash rent in each state. It is not the mean of advertised apartment listings, a rent quote for a particular bedroom count, or the rent paid by every household. Median gross rent includes monthly utility and fuel costs where renters pay those costs separately, making it broader than contract rent alone.

The official U.S. median is $1,487. Eighteen states have published state medians above that benchmark; 32 are below. Separately, the unweighted median of the 50 state-level estimates is $1,305. Those two numbers answer different questions: one summarizes renter-occupied units nationally; the other treats every state equally regardless of its renter population.

Washington, D.C., is not a state and is excluded from these 50 positions. Its separately published 2024 estimate is $1,931 ±$43, which would appear between Hawaii and Massachusetts in a 51-jurisdiction ordering. Puerto Rico and the national figure are also excluded from the state ranking.

Top 10 States by Median Gross Rent in 2024

Six of the ten highest published state medians occur in the Census West region, compared with two in the Northeast and two in the South. The figures below are monthly gross rent estimates, not current asking rents; the margin of error alongside each estimate helps interpret close comparisons.

Top 10 of 50 states · 2024 ACS 1-Year B25064 · U.S. dollars per month

90% MOE means the Census-published 90% margin of error, not a fee added to monthly rent. The state rank reflects the published point estimate; it is not a statistical significance result.

Chart: Top 20 States by Monthly Gross Rent

Each bar uses the same dollar estimate as the 50-state table. California is the 100% reference bar; all other bar widths equal their state's 2024 ACS median gross rent divided by California's $2,104, multiplied by 100. The figures at right are monthly dollars, not percentages.

Methodology and Data Reliability

Reproducible calculations

State ranking: order the 50 values of B25064_E001 from largest to smallest; rank = 1 + number of states with a strictly higher published value. National benchmark comparison: count states where B25064_E001 exceeds the separately published national estimate ($1,487). Regional median: sort the state medians in a Census region and take the center value (or average the two center values for an even state count), with one equal weight per state. State-median median: average the 25th and 26th sorted values across 50 states: ($1,291 + $1,319) / 2 = $1,305. These are calculations from observed official estimates, not projections.

Spread and chart: highest minus lowest = $2,104 − $883 = $1,221 per month; ratio = $2,104 / $883 = 2.38 after rounding. Chart width = state B25064_E001 / $2,104 × 100%, rounded to one decimal. No population or household weights are applied to region or state-median summaries, and the official national median is never derived by averaging the state medians.

Inclusion and quality rules: only 2024 ACS 1-Year B25064 state records with published estimates and 90% MOEs are used. No 2024 ACS 5-Year figures, other years, rent-index models, contract-rent series, forecasts, cities or metro areas are mixed into the ranked rows. There are no missing or stale included rows and no competing numeric publishers to reconcile. Both the official Census table and its original table-based summary file provide a reproducible audit path, but count as one independent numeric publisher.

Limitations: ACS estimates are sampled and have uncertainty and nonsampling limitations; medians do not describe the range of unit sizes or the burden relative to income. The Census Bureau also raised the maximum accepted monthly contract-rent amount from $10,000 to $20,000 for 2024 processing, which warrants care when comparing high-rent areas with pre-2024 years. This page does not estimate a year-on-year change, inflation-adjusted rent, a 2026 rental level or a housing affordability score. Data retrieved October 11, 2026.

Full Ranking: Median Gross Rent in All 50 States

Search by state, filter by Census region and value status, sort the existing entries, or show the first 10, first 20 or all 50 states. Rank always refers to the complete 2024 state comparison; a filter does not create a new rank.

Official ACS 2024 1-Year state estimates · USD/month · descending rank · source code B25064_E001

No states match the selected filters. Try another state name, region, status, or display limit.

All rows: value_status = official_value; numeric publisher = U.S. Census Bureau; survey and target year = ACS 2024 1-Year; measure = dollars per month; published 90% MOE appears in the last column. The duplicate rank 44 is intentional for two equal $998 estimates.

Four Findings Beyond the State Order

What the Ranking Means for Renters and Researchers

A high rank means a higher median monthly rent-and-utilities estimate among existing renter-occupied units paying cash rent; it does not show what a newly available apartment will list for today. The figures are statewide, so local neighborhoods, metro areas, unit sizes and housing types can differ substantially from the statewide middle value.

A low state median should not be called more affordable without local income data. Rent burden requires a different numerator-and-denominator measure, such as ACS B25070, and is intentionally not inferred from these rent levels. The national $1,487 figure likewise cannot be reconstructed as an unweighted average of state medians.

The row-level 90% margins of error distinguish a published estimate from an exact administrative rent register. Especially when ranked values differ by only a few dollars, interpret positions as the order of reported estimates rather than proof that one state's true median must exceed another's.

Frequently Asked Questions

Sources and Verification Trail

All 50 numeric rows originate from a single independent publishing organization, the U.S. Census Bureau. Separate Bureau resources document the measure, geography, processing and uncertainty; they are not counted as independent numeric publishers.