While most apartment markets across the country display some seasonality in demand, the pattern was especially pronounced in St. Louis where Q4 losses proved so big that progress made earlier this year got wiped out entirely.
The St. Louis apartment market absorbed more units in 3rd quarter 2012 than in any other quarter over the past decade. But fewer vacancies didn’t translate to more rent growth.
This is a spot where seasonal struggles late in the year very often prove to be quite pronounced, and the pattern registered again at the end of 2011 for St. Louis.
The St. Louis employment market has been steadily adding jobs in 2011, and that progress is translating to solid apartment demand numbers, but rent growth levels have been more modest.
While the apartment market performance in metro St. Louis isn’t exactly charging back, some improvement has registered of late in both occupancy and rents.
Recent performance shifts in St. Louis’s apartment market pretty closely trace the national norms.