ZIP 30035 is both a Zillow ZIP market identifier and a matched Census ZCTA. A ZCTA is a statistical area and is not identical to a USPS delivery ZIP. In June 2026, Zillow’s ZIP ZORI was $1,823 per month, representing a typical observed asking-rent index blended across rental types rather than a lease-specific quote. The arithmetic 30% required-income screen is $72,920 annually, above the ZCTA median household income of $66,799; the index therefore equals 32.7% of that median income. That screen is not advice, a household budget, or an applicant qualification rule, but it establishes the central tension: the current asking-rent snapshot is high relative to this area-wide income benchmark.
Backward-looking Zillow history shows positive rent direction, though the pace is uneven across horizons. Exact same-month change was 3.4% over 1 year, 3.0% annualized over 3 years, and 5.0% annualized over 5 years. Thus, the latest direction confirms continued growth but remains below the longer five-year pace. Monthly-return variability annualized to 2.9%, indicating that a single current ZORI observation warrants moderate rather than absolute confidence. The historical maximum drawdown was only 1.9%, which suggests the observed index experienced a limited peak-to-trough retreat within its covered history. Coverage reached 99.3%. Transparent national discovery ranks among history-eligible ZIPs were 910 for momentum, 1,480 for stability, and 944 for the balanced measure, where lower ranks are higher; these are descriptive discovery tools, not forecasts or investment recommendations.
The rent sources answer different questions. The matched Census ZCTA 2024 ACS five-year survey reports median gross rent of $1,665 for occupied renter homes, and that measure includes selected utilities; it is not an asking-rent series. HUD FMR/SAFMR is instead an administrative, bedroom-specific standard rather than asking rent: its local two-bedroom standard is $1,730, making the current ZORI 5.4% higher. Applying the local HUD bedroom ladder to ZIP ZORI produces modelled, not measured, monthly bedroom estimates: $1,591 for a studio, the ACS median for a one-bedroom, $1,823 for two bedrooms, $2,181 for three bedrooms, and $2,613 for four bedrooms. These scaled estimates are useful for comparing bedroom tiers, but they do not replace live unit-level asking rents.
Wider geographies place the ZIP’s index above nearby contexts without converting those contexts into local evidence: Decatur city’s context rent is $1,762, DeKalb County’s context rent is $1,781, and the Atlanta-Sandy Springs-Alpharetta metro context rent is $1,854. Those city, county, and metro figures are broader-scope comparisons, not ZIP rental observations. The local ACS renter-burden share is 63.0%, compared with 44.7% in Decatur city and 58.5% in DeKalb County, each within its own ACS geography. The higher local burden reading is consistent with the income-screen tension, but it does not establish the circumstances, lease terms, utilities, or affordability of any particular household or unit.
The matched ZCTA ACS housing profile provides a separate stock and vacancy lens. Of 8,841 housing units, 6,316 are single-family units, while 3,975 occupied homes are owner occupied and 3,027 are renter occupied. There are 1,839 vacant units, producing a 20.8% vacancy rate, and 376 of those vacant units are classified as available for rent. This mix indicates that asking-rent pressure is occurring alongside a substantial survey-measured vacant stock rather than a simple absence of homes. Yet the ACS counts are survey estimates with sampling uncertainty, and vacancy classifications do not reveal unit condition, timing of availability, landlord pricing, concessions, or whether a listed vacancy competes with a specific renter’s search.
The direct rolling-three-month ZIP resale observation supplies a different market signal. Median sold price was $245,245, up 2.2% from a year earlier, with 77 homes sold and a median 81 days on market. The for-sale record showed 227 active listings, a separate inventory count of 123, and 4.8 months of supply. Sellers received 98.96% of list price on average, while 13.4% of sales closed above list. Annualized ZIP ZORI divided by median sold price is 8.92%, but that is only a cross-source screening ratio. It is not a cap rate, net return, expected return, property yield, or measure of property-level operating economics. All of these resale measures describe for-sale transactions, not rental transactions or rental comparables.
The strongest cross-source tension is that rents have retained a positive historical path while the current income screen and renter-burden evidence remain strained. The resale price increase broadly confirms that rent and resale measures are not moving in opposite directions, but it does not prove a relationship between them. At the same time, extended resale marketing time, meaningful supply, and average sale-to-list results below full list challenge any reading of the ZIP as uniformly fast-moving. The survey vacancy profile adds another caution: an area can show elevated vacant stock while its blended asking-rent index remains high. A current rent snapshot should therefore be read as a broad market signal rather than a complete account of available unit choices or transaction liquidity.
Several limits should govern use of this report. ZORI tracks blended asking rents; ACS describes occupied renter homes over a survey period; HUD standards are administrative; and Redfin measures resale activity over a rolling period. Their differing timing, populations, and definitions prevent direct substitution. Property-level review should identify the exact bedroom count, unit condition, asking rent, utility responsibility, concessions, availability date, lease term, listing history, and any evidence that a vacancy is actually rentable. For a sale comparison, the relevant checks are the specific property’s sale date, list history, physical characteristics, condition, and transaction status. Those checks determine whether the ZIP-level signals meaningfully correspond to the individual home under consideration.
","findings":[{"body":"The ZIP’s current blended asking-rent index sits above the area-wide household-income screen used in the report. This does not identify what any renter can pay, but it makes income, utilities, concessions, and lease terms essential variables when translating a ZIP-level rent measure into a household-level decision.","title":"Income-screen tension is central"},{"body":"Same-month rent history remains positive across each reported horizon, yet the newest annual pace trails the longer historical pace. Modest monthly variability and a limited historical drawdown support continuity in the index, while still leaving room for listing-level differences that a blended market measure cannot show.","title":"Rent history remains positive but slower than its longest path"},{"body":"The ZCTA survey shows a sizeable vacant housing stock and a meaningful number of units classified as available for rent. That evidence should not be treated as proof that a particular home is available, comparable, or negotiable, but it prevents a simple scarcity-only interpretation of the asking-rent index.","title":"Survey vacancy complicates the rent reading"},{"body":"The ZIP resale observation shows positive annual price movement alongside relatively extended marketing time, meaningful supply, and sale-to-list results below full list on average. These signals inform for-sale liquidity only. They neither establish rental transaction pricing nor convert the rent-to-price screen into property economics.","title":"Resale evidence is directional, not rental evidence"}],"risks":["A blended asking-rent index can conceal sharp differences by bedroom count, property condition, utilities, lease length, concessions, listing freshness, and whether a unit is actually available when a renter searches.","ACS figures describe occupied renter homes over a multi-year survey window and include selected utilities in gross rent, so they cannot be read as contemporaneous asking rents or unit-specific affordability evidence.","The local vacancy reading is a survey classification rather than a live inventory feed. It cannot demonstrate that vacant homes are rentable, comparable, well maintained, competitively priced, or accessible to a specific household.","The resale screen combines annualized asking-rent index data with median sold-price data from a different source universe. It excludes operating costs, financing, taxes, maintenance, vacancy experience, and transaction-specific property characteristics."],"qa":[{"a":"They measure different populations and purposes. Zillow ZORI is a blended ZIP-level index of observed asking rents across rental types. ACS median gross rent is a survey measure for occupied renter homes and includes selected utilities. HUD FMR or SAFMR is an administrative bedroom-specific standard, not an asking-rent observation.","q":"Why do Zillow, ACS, and HUD show different rent figures?"},{"a":"No. The bedroom figures are modelled estimates created by scaling the ZIP ZORI with the local HUD bedroom ladder. They provide a consistent way to compare relative bedroom tiers, but they are not measured lease rents, live listings, executed transactions, or guarantees of available units.","q":"Are the bedroom rent figures observed rents for local apartments?"},{"a":"No. The burden result is an ACS area-level survey measure describing renter households, while the required-income screen is arithmetic based on the ZIP asking-rent index. Neither measure identifies a household’s income, utility obligations, household size, debt, assistance, lease concessions, or the terms of a particular unit.","q":"Does the renter-burden result prove that a specific unit is unaffordable?"},{"a":"It is simply annualized ZIP ZORI divided by the direct ZIP median sold price from the resale dataset. Because it combines separate source universes and excludes all property operating costs and transaction details, it is only a cross-source screening ratio and should not be interpreted as a cap rate, yield, or return forecast.","q":"What does the ZIP rent-to-price screening ratio actually mean?"}],"sources":[{"key":"apartment_list_time_on_market","name":"Apartment List Time on Market — listing liquidity","release":"Apartment List 2026-07","pulledAt":"2026-08-08","url":"https://www.apartmentlist.com/research/category/data-rent-estimates"},{"key":"apartment_list_vacancy","name":"Apartment List Vacancy Index — rental vacancy","release":"Apartment List 2026-07","pulledAt":"2026-08-08","url":"https://www.apartmentlist.com/research/apartment-list-vacancy-index-methodology"},{"key":"census_zcta_facts","name":"Census ACS five-year — ZCTA housing and income","release":"ACS 2024 5-year ZCTA","pulledAt":"2026-08-08","url":"https://api.census.gov/data/2024/acs/acs5.html"},{"key":"hud_zip","name":"HUD USPS crosswalk and Small Area FMRs — ZIP rent fallback","release":"ZIP-CBSA 2025Q4 + SAFMR FY2026","pulledAt":"2026-07-26","url":"https://www.huduser.gov/portal/datasets/usps_crosswalk.html"},{"key":"realtor_county","name":"Realtor.com Economic Research — county listing inventory","release":"county inventory 2026-06","pulledAt":"2026-07-28","url":"https://www.realtor.com/research/data/"},{"key":"redfin","name":"Redfin Data Center — inventory, days on market, and price cuts","release":"metro tracker through 2026-05-01","pulledAt":"2026-07-26","url":"https://www.redfin.com/news/data-center/"},{"key":"redfin_zip","name":"Redfin Data Center — ZIP resale activity and supply","release":"ZIP rolling 3 months through 2026-06-30; updated 2026-07-03","pulledAt":"2026-08-12","url":"https://www.redfin.com/news/data-center/"},{"key":"zillow_county","name":"Zillow ZHVI and ZORI — county values and rents","release":"county ZHVI/ZORI 2026-06","pulledAt":"2026-07-26","url":"https://www.zillow.com/research/data/"},{"key":"zillow_zori","name":"Zillow ZORI — metro market rents","release":"Metro_zori_uc_sfrcondomfr_sm_sa_month.csv","pulledAt":"2026-07-26","url":"https://www.zillow.com/research/data/"},{"key":"zillow_zori_city","name":"Zillow ZORI — city market rents","release":"zillow_zori_city.csv","pulledAt":"2026-07-29","url":"https://www.zillow.com/research/data/"},{"key":"zillow_zori_zip","name":"Zillow ZORI — ZIP market rents","release":"ZORI ZIP 2026-06","pulledAt":"2026-08-08","url":"https://www.zillow.com/research/data/"}],"history":[{"period":"2015-01-01","rent":835.297501},{"period":"2015-02-01","rent":835.884895},{"period":"2015-03-01","rent":833.675909},{"period":"2015-04-01","rent":827.508119},{"period":"2015-05-01","rent":826.662174},{"period":"2015-06-01","rent":833.180586},{"period":"2015-07-01","rent":837.089139},{"period":"2015-08-01","rent":840.26871},{"period":"2015-09-01","rent":842.275172},{"period":"2015-10-01","rent":841.284355},{"period":"2015-11-01","rent":864.113922},{"period":"2015-12-01","rent":869.622816},{"period":"2016-01-01","rent":875.863576},{"period":"2016-02-01","rent":863.67139},{"period":"2016-03-01","rent":872.008077},{"period":"2016-04-01","rent":883.609685},{"period":"2016-05-01","rent":891.82293},{"period":"2016-06-01","rent":885.869157},{"period":"2016-07-01","rent":889.119854},{"period":"2016-08-01","rent":897.250768},{"period":"2016-09-01","rent":906.766735},{"period":"2016-10-01","rent":917.247303},{"period":"2016-11-01","rent":915.564657},{"period":"2016-12-01","rent":908.348123},{"period":"2017-01-01","rent":908.822946},{"period":"2017-02-01","rent":918.878102},{"period":"2017-03-01","rent":935.685956},{"period":"2017-04-01","rent":933.270727},{"period":"2017-05-01","rent":939.933984},{"period":"2017-06-01","rent":943.468565},{"period":"2017-07-01","rent":959.814874},{"period":"2017-08-01","rent":964.90411},{"period":"2017-09-01","rent":971.979446},{"period":"2017-10-01","rent":968.550245},{"period":"2017-11-01","rent":959.313142},{"period":"2017-12-01","rent":968.122333},{"period":"2018-01-01","rent":965.772025},{"period":"2018-02-01","rent":983.798923},{"period":"2018-03-01","rent":980.074879},{"period":"2018-04-01","rent":1003.583404},{"period":"2018-05-01","rent":1005.394222},{"period":"2018-06-01","rent":1016.00415},{"period":"2018-07-01","rent":1017.147374},{"period":"2018-08-01","rent":1029.469389},{"period":"2018-09-01","rent":1026.20473},{"period":"2018-10-01","rent":1034.310156},{"period":"2018-11-01","rent":1042.106253},{"period":"2019-01-01","rent":1078.3529},{"period":"2019-02-01","rent":1084.38638},{"period":"2019-03-01","rent":1093.67655},{"period":"2019-04-01","rent":1090.281679},{"period":"2019-05-01","rent":1100.958074},{"period":"2019-06-01","rent":1109.332388},{"period":"2019-07-01","rent":1116.746312},{"period":"2019-08-01","rent":1120.024686},{"period":"2019-09-01","rent":1134.78356},{"period":"2019-10-01","rent":1145.589872},{"period":"2019-11-01","rent":1161.65906},{"period":"2019-12-01","rent":1157.035195},{"period":"2020-01-01","rent":1164.203383},{"period":"2020-02-01","rent":1164.220453},{"period":"2020-03-01","rent":1182.899306},{"period":"2020-04-01","rent":1213.302606},{"period":"2020-05-01","rent":1237.04071},{"period":"2020-06-01","rent":1245.897268},{"period":"2020-07-01","rent":1246.640475},{"period":"2020-08-01","rent":1255.517463},{"period":"2020-09-01","rent":1260.6155},{"period":"2020-10-01","rent":1260.79448},{"period":"2020-11-01","rent":1281.537615},{"period":"2020-12-01","rent":1306.188774},{"period":"2021-01-01","rent":1316.172266},{"period":"2021-02-01","rent":1328.32307},{"period":"2021-03-01","rent":1367.81454},{"period":"2021-04-01","rent":1387.079956},{"period":"2021-05-01","rent":1403.589442},{"period":"2021-06-01","rent":1428.834653},{"period":"2021-07-01","rent":1460.857953},{"period":"2021-08-01","rent":1461.661646},{"period":"2021-09-01","rent":1469.511845},{"period":"2021-10-01","rent":1490.415484},{"period":"2021-11-01","rent":1518.432305},{"period":"2021-12-01","rent":1509.069227},{"period":"2022-01-01","rent":1530.470265},{"period":"2022-02-01","rent":1549.375712},{"period":"2022-03-01","rent":1559.67052},{"period":"2022-04-01","rent":1548.965946},{"period":"2022-05-01","rent":1554.475567},{"period":"2022-06-01","rent":1572.268278},{"period":"2022-07-01","rent":1587.080978},{"period":"2022-08-01","rent":1617.500663},{"period":"2022-09-01","rent":1635.553346},{"period":"2022-10-01","rent":1655.374317},{"period":"2022-11-01","rent":1644.048218},{"period":"2022-12-01","rent":1673.954282},{"period":"2023-01-01","rent":1660.36287},{"period":"2023-02-01","rent":1659.107396},{"period":"2023-03-01","rent":1645.085908},{"period":"2023-04-01","rent":1669.445457},{"period":"2023-05-01","rent":1678.454197},{"period":"2023-06-01","rent":1669.407548},{"period":"2023-07-01","rent":1663.734999},{"period":"2023-08-01","rent":1667.385311},{"period":"2023-09-01","rent":1663.246071},{"period":"2023-10-01","rent":1650.85759},{"period":"2023-11-01","rent":1646.339216},{"period":"2023-12-01","rent":1646.143252},{"period":"2024-01-01","rent":1672.685094},{"period":"2024-02-01","rent":1681.45409},{"period":"2024-03-01","rent":1693.304195},{"period":"2024-04-01","rent":1680.748552},{"period":"2024-05-01","rent":1682.761978},{"period":"2024-06-01","rent":1695.103344},{"period":"2024-07-01","rent":1706.053023},{"period":"2024-08-01","rent":1715.109417},{"period":"2024-09-01","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