At the center of the packet, 80221’s June 2026 Zillow Observed Rent Index, or ZORI, is $2,257 per month. It is a typical observed asking-rent index blended across rental types, and its exact same-month one-year change is 0.8%. This five-digit Zillow ZIP market identifier is matched to a Census ZCTA; a ZCTA is a statistical area and is not identical to a USPS delivery ZIP. The matched 2024 ACS five-year survey reports $1,666 median gross rent for occupied renter homes, including selected utilities. ZORI is 35.5% above that figure, but the gap joins unlike sources, timing, and populations rather than resolving the rent of any particular home.
Viewed over the full same-month history, this positive recent move does not confirm the earlier pace: the 3-year annualized ZORI change was 2.1%, and the 5-year change was 4.4%. The record has complete 100% coverage, with 91 monthly observations and 90 consecutive monthly returns through the stated endpoint. Annualized monthly-return variability is 2.97%, which suggests a relatively narrow past pattern and gives a reader somewhat more confidence in using one current ZIP snapshot than a highly erratic series would. Separately, the largest observed peak-to-trough decline was 3.27%, a reminder that even this history contains reversals. Transparent national discovery measures place momentum at 38.6 with rank 1,798, stability at 45.9 with rank 1,571, and balance at 41.5 with rank 1,930 among history-eligible ZIPs, where lower rank is higher. These are backward-looking measurements, not forecasts or investment recommendations.
Bedroom figures should not be read as observed ZIP rent comps. Scaling ZIP ZORI by the local HUD ladder creates modelled monthly estimates of $1,775 for a studio, $1,895 for one bedroom, the ZORI level at two bedrooms, $2,954 for three bedrooms, and $3,294 for four bedrooms. They are modelled estimates, never measured bedroom rents. The local HUD FMR/SAFMR two-bedroom standard is $2,089, but HUD FMR/SAFMR is an administrative, bedroom-specific standard rather than asking rent. Its role here is to preserve local bedroom spacing in the model, not to establish an advertised or transacted rent.
An arithmetic 30% screen puts the annual household income needed to cover the current ZORI at $90,280. That exceeds the matched ACS ZCTA median household income of $86,810, and annualized ZORI equals 31.2% of that median income. This is a calculation, not advice and not an applicant qualification rule; a household’s income, lease terms, utility charges, and rent are not supplied here. In the ACS five-year occupied-renter survey, 53.7% of renter households reported rent burdens at or above the stated threshold. That survey burden is useful distributional context, yet it neither establishes whether a newly advertised unit is affordable nor proves any individual renter’s circumstances.
The housing-stock evidence adds a different lens. The matched ACS ZCTA contains 15,677 housing units, with a 3.8% vacancy rate. Its reported structure mix includes 12,135 single-family units and 1,381 large multifamily units, so the available evidence is not limited to one building form. These are five-year survey counts and categories, not a live inventory of units for lease. In particular, a ZCTA-level vacancy measure cannot show that any particular property is empty, rentable, appropriately priced, or suitable for a prospective household. It should therefore remain a market-wide stock indicator rather than unit-level proof.
Broader comparisons reinforce that the ZIP is above these contextual rent figures: in the Denver city scope, the rent figure is $1,877; in the Adams County scope, it is $1,856; and in the Denver-Aurora-Lakewood, CO metro scope, it is $1,930. Each is a city, county, or metro context value, not a substitute for the direct ZIP asking-rent index or the matched ZCTA survey. The comparison is informative as scale context only; it does not convert citywide, countywide, or metro data into ZIP rental comps or identify conditions at any building.
Resale evidence points to a separate tension. The direct rolling-three-month ZIP for-sale observation shows a $494,888 median sold price, down 2.0% from a year earlier, while 130 homes sold with median marketing time of 22 days. Inventory was 159 homes, 1.4% above the prior year, and months of supply stood at 3.7. The average sale-to-list ratio was 99.4%, while 23.0% of sales closed above list. These are resale transactions and liquidity signals, not rental transactions or rental comps. The 5.5% annualized-ZORI-to-median-price figure is only a cross-source screening ratio, neither a cap rate nor a net return, expected return, or property yield. Together, the price decline and slightly higher inventory challenge a simple strengthening interpretation of the positive but decelerated asking-rent history; they do not explain why either series moved.
Read the data through their boundaries before making a property-level comparison. ZORI cannot supply a unit’s condition, concessions, included utilities, lease term, or bedroom configuration; ACS is a survey of occupied renter homes; HUD is a standard; and Redfin here covers for-sale resales. ACS estimates also carry survey uncertainty. Concrete property-level checks should compare the property’s advertised rent and signed lease terms, utilities and concessions, bedroom count, and current sale or list record against the relevant source rather than against an aggregate alone. Confirm the address’s delivery ZIP separately from its ZCTA match. Neither vacancy nor rent-burden evidence proves the availability, cost, or fit of a particular unit, and none of these measures supports a forecast.
","findings":[{"body":"ZIP ZORI is positive year over year, but that small latest same-month movement trails its annualized three- and five-year history. Complete coverage makes the deceleration interpretable rather than a missing-data artifact. Recorded monthly variability and the historical drawdown provide context for the snapshot, but all history metrics remain backward-looking and cannot project future rent.","title":"Slow current growth breaks from a stronger long path"},{"body":"The direct Zillow ZIP index reflects typical asking rents across blended rental types. ACS median gross rent describes occupied renter homes in the matched ZCTA and includes selected utilities, while HUD FMR/SAFMR supplies bedroom-specific administrative standards. The bedroom figures are modelled by scaling ZORI with HUD’s ladder. Because timing, population, and purpose differ, none of these series serves as a direct substitute for the others.","title":"Three rent concepts answer different questions"},{"body":"Annualizing the asking-rent index produces a household-income screen above the area’s ACS median household income at the stated threshold. The ACS burden share indicates that many occupied renter households report higher rent burdens, while the survey stock data provide an aggregate vacancy measure. Neither result identifies a unit’s price, availability, utility package, household income, or eligibility.","title":"Affordability signal is pressured but not unit-specific"},{"body":"Direct ZIP resale evidence records a year-over-year decline in median sold price alongside completed sales, limited marketing time, and measurable supply. Those for-sale observations are not rental transactions, yet they challenge any unqualified claim that the positive current rent reading signals broad strengthening. Annualized ZORI divided by median sale price is only a cross-source screening ratio and says nothing about a property’s operating costs.","title":"Resale data complicate the rent snapshot"}],"risks":["The observed asking-rent index blends rental types and does not reveal a unit’s condition, concessions, utilities, lease duration, bedroom mix, or signed rent, so direct listing checks remain essential.","The ACS ZCTA is a five-year survey area rather than a USPS delivery ZIP, and its gross-rent, burden, income, vacancy, and stock estimates cannot identify conditions at a specific address.","HUD standards and modelled bedroom estimates may be useful for relative scaling, but neither is measured asking rent; treating them as lease comparables could overstate precision at the bedroom level.","Resale price and liquidity indicators come only from for-sale transactions, while the cross-source rent-to-price screen contains no property-level operating or lease information and cannot establish property economics."],"qa":[{"a":"ZORI is a June 2026 ZIP-level typical observed asking-rent index across blended rental types. ACS is a 2024 five-year survey for occupied renter homes in the matched ZCTA and includes selected utilities. The ZCTA is statistical rather than USPS geography. Those differing dates, populations, and definitions make the spread a source-universe distinction, not a unit-level price gap.","q":"Why does the asking-rent index exceed ACS median gross rent?"},{"a":"No. The studio-through-four-bedroom figures are modelled estimates created by scaling ZIP ZORI with the local HUD FMR/SAFMR bedroom ladder. HUD is a bedroom-specific administrative standard, not asking rent, and the method uses ZORI as the two-bedroom anchor. The figures provide relative size spacing only; they do not document advertised, signed, or transacted bedroom-specific rents.","q":"Are the bedroom figures observed market rents?"},{"a":"It divides annualized ZIP ZORI by the stated share of income and compares the resulting income figure with the matched ACS ZCTA median household income. It is arithmetic rather than advice, a credit standard, or an applicant qualification rule. ACS rent-burden reporting instead describes occupied renter households in a survey; neither measure determines whether one household or one listed unit is affordable.","q":"What does the 30% required-income screen demonstrate?"},{"a":"Use them as a direct rolling-three-month ZIP for-sale observation of prices and liquidity, not as rental comps or evidence of tenant demand. The median-sale-price comparison can create an annualized ZORI-to-price screening ratio, but that ratio is not a cap rate, net return, expected return, or property yield. Compare its tension with rent history without assuming either market causes the other.","q":"How should Redfin resale indicators be used alongside rents?"}],"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 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