- April 28, 2024
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Karen Smith, 67, said she never expected to be renting a room out of a stranger’s home at her age.
“It's a shame, you know? I thought I had planned and planned and planned,” Smith said. “Not as well as I should have.”
Smith is retired and receives social security, which is not enough for her to even rent an apartment on her own in Palm Coast, which has a median rental price of almost $2,000, according to several real estate reports. She moved back to Florida in 2021 when she retired but quickly found that renting a home or an apartment was out of her price range.
The one bedroom Smith rents costs over half of her social security, utilities included, and she spends several hundred more each month in medical expenses. The room is a master bedroom in the house, with a private bathroom. She has a full-size refrigerator inside, a microwave and a hot plate to cook on.
The family she rents from is very nice, she said, but she tries to spend as much time as possible outside.
“That one room gets small,” Smith said.
Smith’s story is not unique. A recent report from Rent.com, a national rental website, said data over the last year shows a 9.41% decrease in rent prices in Florida, but despite the decrease the median rent is still $2,095.
Another report from the rental website Zumper.com which lists over 300 Palm Coast properties for rent, showed prices in Palm Coast have decreased 11% from January 2023 — but the median price of a rental property is still $1,950 per month.
In Ormond Beach, the median price of a rental property is $2,350, based on the 90 rentals listed on Zumper. Overall, rent has gone up 2% from January 2023, though that is largely due to the price of studio rental properties, up 80% from last year, according to the website. Rent for one-, two-, three- and four-bedroom properties are all down from last year — 17%, 6%, 1% and 27%, respectively.
Joseph Palmer, broker and owner of Sunrise Property Management of Volusia County, said the rent decreases are a result of supply and demand. Less people are inquiring on rental properties listed at over $1,800 a month than they were a couple years ago.
The listings that would generate between two and three dozen inquiries within days started to decrease to about three or four only around August or September 2023.
"It stayed that way all through last fall and carried also into this year where we're not getting the volume of inquiries that we've had," Palmer said.
He believes it could be a result of less people moving into the area compared to immediately after the COVID-19 pandemic. Regardless, the decrease in inquiries led many of his property owners to drop the rent on their properties by at least 10%.
Our market is under supplied at every level."
— TOBY TOBIN, Palm Coast real estate agent
Now, properties priced under $1,800 a month — what Palmer described as the breaking point — still generate dozens of inquiries. But, those properties account for about 20% of the total rentals his company manages.
Palm Coast real estate agent Toby Tobin said just because the rents have decreased some over the last year, it does not mean that prices are more affordable. The prices of the housing and rental markets are both driven by supply and demand, he said.
"Our market is under supplied at every level," Tobin said. "There aren't enough condominiums or apartments. There aren't enough duplex homes for rent, single family homes for rent ... or homes to buy ourselves."
Tobin said the decrease in prices shown in the two reports Flagler County and Palm Coast are likely from the additional multifamily housing that has been added to the market or is under construction.
"Landlords don't lower the rent to benefit the tenant," Tobin said. "They lower the rent to make their property more attractive for new tenants."
Palmer said he could see the rental market continue to decrease — until a certain point, as rising property taxes and insurance costs means the dollar amount for rental property owners and landlords to break even continues to rise as well.
"I think it's a big factor," Palmer said. "Even HOA dues have gone up, especially with condos."
Even HOA dues have gone up, especially with condos."
— JOSEPH PALMER, broker and owner of Sunrise Property Management
If properties sustained hurricane damages and the cost of the repairs wasn't covered by either insurance or funds in reserve, HOAs had to raise fees, Palmer said.
The number of apartments being constructed is also a contributing factor. A resident looking at renting a condo may opt to rent a unit in a new apartment complex instead, as those may come with more amenities.
"There's always going to be owners that have single family homes and condos for rent, and they just need to price it accordingly," Palmer said.
About 42% of full-time workers in Volusia County and 46% of full-time workers in Flagler County do not earn enough for household survival, said Lawrence Anderson, community partnerships manager for the Community Foundation and United Way of Volusia-Flagler Counties. United Way refers to these individuals as ALICE, or the “Asset Limited, Income Constrained, Employed” population.
Of the 42% of ALICE households in Volusia, 74% are considered rent-burdened or severe rent-burdened, meaning they are spending more than 30% of their income on housing.
"That's extremely worrisome," Anderson said. "While our United Way or other nonprofit partners cannot change the market rate for all rental properties and for housing properties in the area, what we are looking to do is make sure that we advocate for the decrease of rental costs, for the increase of employee incomes and making sure that there are additional resources brought into our community to ensure that this population ... have affordable housing options in the area."
So families are still experiencing increased costs of living across the board."
— LAWRENCE ANDERSON, Community Foundation community partnerships manager
Plus, while rents have decreased a little bit compared to last year — United Way is seeing 1% decrease in median rental costs in Port Orange, 3% decrease in Daytona Beach and New Smyrna Beach, and 2% decrease in Daytona Beach Shores, for example — families are dealing with cost increases outside of housing, such as health care, child care and food expenses.
"So families are still experiencing increased costs of living across the board," Anderson said.
And while median rental costs are down compared to 2023, United Way is seeing rent increases today compared to last month's. Median rent for a four-bedroom apartment in Palm Coast is up 16% from last month. In Daytona Beach, three-bedroom apartments are up 4%.
According to the U.S. Census Bureau data from 2018 to 2022, Flagler County’s median income was $69,000. A home is considered affordable, Tobin said, if a person is not spending more than 30% of their income on rent or a mortgage payment.
The problem is most properties in Flagler County — to purchase or to rent — are out of the median income price range.
Someone making the median income would qualify for a home purchasing loan of around $225,000. In January or February 2024, 355 homes were sold in Flagler — Tobin said only five of those properties were $225,000 or less. The average home in Palm Coast is over $300,000.
Examining rental properties shows similar results. Tobin reviewed all 177 rental properties in Flagler County on the Multiple Listing Service.
The cheapest rental was listed for $950, he said, but that is an outlier. The second cheapest was $1,350 per month while the median price of the 177 properties was $2,000, on par with the averages from Rent.com and Zumper.com.
There used to be a time where local families could find properties for rent within their budget that were adequate for their household size — they may just not have been as updated as they would have preferred, Anderson said.
"Now, that's not quite the case," he said. "Families are looking for the bare minimum, as long as they're able to afford it. It's just not there. The need is a bit greater than what we currently have available."
The need is a bit greater than what we currently have available."
—LAWRENCE ANDERSON, Community Foundation community partnerships manager
There is a lot of development coming to Volusia and Flagler counties, Anderson added. That creates options for housing solutions — nonprofits and businesses have to advocate for that.
"We understand that not all employers can pay $60,000 for their employees to live in our community," Anderson said. "But if employers can provide supports and resources for their employees, it will allow us to better maneuver the housing crisis that we're experiencing around the country."
Smith said she didn't have a lot of options when looking for housing last fall. She applied a low-income housing voucher almost two years ago and has been wait-listed for it: if she goes back to work, she will make too much money to receive that housing, should a spot opens up.
Even without the voucher to consider, she said, it would be difficult to work full time with her health problems.
Tobin said the high prices have made for an "under the radar" real estate market where renters sublet space without telling landlords or homeowners will rent out a room, either to short-term vacationers or people like Smith.
For her, Smith said her situation is what it is and her health will only get worse as time goes on. Mostly, she said, she’s disappointed that the housing situation in the United States is like this, leaving many people like herself overlooked.
“I don't see me ever getting out of that little bedroom,” she said.
