Current rent and reported renter experience do not sit in the same data universe in 98661. At June 2026, Zillow places ZORI at $1,752 per month. This is Zillow’s ZIP-level typical observed asking-rent index blended across rental types, rather than a lease average or bedroom quote. The same five-digit label is a Zillow ZIP market identifier and a Census ZCTA match; a ZCTA is a statistical area, not identical to a USPS delivery ZIP. The matched ACS 2024 five-year survey of occupied renter homes reports $1,512 median gross rent, including selected utilities. Its lower level compares surveyed occupied homes with a current asking-rent index, so it cannot substitute for an advertised-rent measure or identify the payment on an individual unit.
Applying the 30% income convention arithmetically, rather than as advice or an applicant qualification rule, produces a $70,080 annual income screen for the current ZIP index. That income is below the matched ZCTA’s $76,913 median household income. Yet the ACS burden distribution reports that 52.1% of renter households have gross-rent burdens at or above that convention. The income screen and burden measure need not agree: one pairs a current asking-rent index with a survey median income, while the other reflects occupied renters’ reported gross rent, including selected utilities. Neither result proves that any available apartment is affordable or unaffordable to a particular household; together, they show an aggregate arithmetic screen alongside widespread reported burden.
Backward-looking same-month rent history puts the muted current level in perspective. Through June 2026, the one-year and three-year annualized changes each measure 0.8%, versus a 3.4% five-year CAGR. Recent direction thus breaks from the longer path of stronger gains rather than confirming it. Annualized monthly-return variability came in at 2.0%, which supports more confidence in a single current index snapshot than a highly erratic series would, although it does not make the index a lease quote. Separately, the historical maximum drawdown reached -3.7%, showing that the series did experience declines. The record has 100% coverage. National discovery ranks among history-eligible ZIPs are 165 for stability and 2,106 for momentum, where lower ranks are higher. These are historical measurements, not forecasts or investment recommendations.
Resale evidence gives the rent slowdown a separate, for-sale-market lens. Redfin’s direct rolling-three-month ZIP resale observation has a $455,897 median sold price, up 0.2% year over year, with 139 homes sold and a 22-day median marketing time. Inventory is 145 homes after an 11.7% annual rise, and months of supply are 3.2. An average sale-to-list ratio of 100.04% is a near-list signal despite added inventory. This is evidence about for-sale transactions, never rental transactions or property economics. It broadly confirms history’s reduced pace because both resale-price and asking-rent changes are subdued, while the close-to-list signal challenges any simple claim that larger inventory alone denotes weak resale demand. Annualized ZIP ZORI divided by median sold price is 4.61%, only a cross-source screening ratio, not a cap rate, net return, expected return, or property yield.
Bedroom figures are best used as a transparent scaling exercise, not as evidence of measured rents. The modelled ZIP estimates apply the local HUD ladder to ZORI: $1,431 for a studio, $1,529 for a one-bedroom, $1,752 for a two-bedroom, $2,387 for a three-bedroom, and $2,834 for a four-bedroom each month. These are modelled estimates rather than measured bedroom rents, lease comparables, or predictions. The FY2026 local HUD two-bedroom FMR is $1,922, so the two-bedroom model/ZORI anchor is below it. HUD FMR/SAFMR is an administrative, bedroom-specific standard, not asking rent. It supplies the local ladder shape, while Zillow supplies the blended ZIP asking-rent anchor; condition, utility treatment, availability, and exact configuration can leave a particular listing materially different.
The ZCTA’s ACS housing snapshot provides tenure and vacancy context, not a live availability feed. It counts 22,302 housing units and a 5.3% vacancy rate; renters account for 57.3% of occupied homes. ACS also separates vacant units into for-rent, for-sale, and seasonal classifications, but those categories do not tell when a unit could be leased, its physical condition, its concessions, or whether it matches a reader’s bedroom need. The renter-heavy base makes it useful to consider the burden figures alongside ZORI, while the vacancy measure should remain an area-level survey statistic. It cannot establish vacancy, turnover, or rent pressure for any named building or unit.
Viewed only as wider context, the city of Vancouver, Washington rent benchmark is $1,818, Clark County’s rent benchmark is $1,874, and the Portland-Vancouver-Hillsboro, OR-WA metro rent benchmark is $1,805. Each value belongs to a city, county, or metro scope rather than this ZIP’s direct ZORI series. The ZIP’s renter share is above the city and county context shares, and its vacancy rate is also above both wider-area measures. In contrast, the metro rent-to-income context screen is lower than the ZIP’s arithmetic screen. Those comparisons can describe relative positioning, but differences in geography, timing, and underlying measures prevent them from being direct substitutes for the ZIP index, the ZCTA survey, or the direct ZIP resale observation.
These data answer different questions at different geographies and times. ZORI is an index, the HUD ladder is an administrative standard, ACS is a survey of occupied renter homes, and Redfin is an observed ZIP resale series; none supplies property cash flows, unit-level utilities, contract rent, concessions, renovation state, or bedroom verification. A property-level interpretation would require the actual advertised rent and lease terms, bedroom and utility configuration, comparable current listings, physical condition, days actually available, and sale records that match property type and timing. It should also separate any owner expenses or financing from the cross-source rent-price screen. The decision tension is therefore not a forecast: a broadly stable rent history and a required-income screen below the ZCTA median coexist with reported renter burden and a resale market whose inventory and sale-to-list readings pull in different directions.
","findings":[{"body":"Zillow’s June 2026 ZORI is $1,752, while ACS 2024 median gross rent is $1,512. The difference is informative only after scope is preserved: ZORI tracks typical observed asking rents across rental types, and ACS samples occupied renter homes and includes selected utilities. The result is a current-versus-survey contrast, not an inconsistency that can be resolved by selecting one figure as universally correct.","title":"Current asking rent and survey gross rent are not interchangeable"},{"body":"Same-month history is slowing: the one-year and three-year measures are each 0.8%, below the 3.4% five-year CAGR. Low annualized monthly-return variability and full coverage make the record relatively consistent, but the drawdown confirms historical declines. The strong stability discovery rank and weak momentum discovery rank describe past ZIP behavior among eligible areas; they are not a prediction.","title":"Historical rent growth has slowed while the series remained stable"},{"body":"The 30% arithmetic screen produces $70,080 of required annual income, below the ZCTA median household income. However, ACS reports 52.1% of renter households at or above that burden threshold. Since the first metric pairs present asking rent with a median income and the second surveys existing gross-rent obligations, neither measure can qualify a household or establish affordability for a particular unit.","title":"The income screen and renter burden present different evidence"},{"body":"Redfin’s direct ZIP resale data show an essentially flat median price change alongside higher inventory, yet transactions are occurring near list price. That mixture confirms the rent history’s slower pace without converting resale information into rent comparables. The annualized ZORI-to-price figure is a cross-source screening ratio only; it excludes property expenses, financing, and all unit-specific operating details.","title":"Resale liquidity is mixed rather than uniformly weak or strong"}],"risks":["The ZCTA matches the ZIP label for this report but does not mirror USPS delivery boundaries; survey households and ZIP index observations can therefore cover overlapping rather than identical geographic populations.","ZORI is a blended typical asking-rent index, whereas ACS gross rent includes selected utilities and reflects occupied homes over a five-year survey period; the two series are not direct substitutes.","The bedroom figures are modelled by scaling ZORI with the HUD ladder. They may differ from actual listings because configuration, condition, utilities, concessions, and availability are not measured here.","Resale inventory and sale-to-list metrics are direct for-sale observations, not rental transactions. The rent-price screen omits expenses, financing, property type, and contract rents, so it cannot describe investment performance."],"qa":[{"a":"They were designed to measure different universes. Zillow ZORI is a current ZIP-level typical observed asking-rent index blended across rental types. ACS median gross rent is a five-year survey of occupied renter homes and includes selected utilities. The ZCTA is statistical geography rather than an identical USPS delivery ZIP, adding a boundary distinction.","q":"Why do the ZORI and ACS rent figures differ?"},{"a":"No. The studio through four-bedroom amounts are modelled estimates created by scaling the ZIP ZORI with the local HUD bedroom ladder. HUD FMR/SAFMR is an administrative, bedroom-specific standard rather than asking rent. Actual listings can differ because of utilities, condition, configuration, concessions, and the timing of availability.","q":"Are the bedroom estimates actual observed rents for each unit size?"},{"a":"No. The calculation merely annualizes the ZORI level and divides it by the 30% convention to create an aggregate income screen. It does not account for household composition, other obligations, cash flow, assistance, or a particular unit’s utilities. It is not advice or a qualification rule.","q":"Does the required-income screen determine whether an applicant qualifies?"},{"a":"It adds a direct ZIP for-sale observation of resale price, turnover, marketing time, inventory, supply, and sale-to-list behavior. It does not add rental comparables or property operating data. Its annualized ZORI-to-price calculation is a cross-source screening ratio only, so it cannot provide a cap rate, yield, or return.","q":"What does the Redfin block add to the rent analysis?"}],"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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2026-06","pulledAt":"2026-08-08","url":"https://www.zillow.com/research/data/"}],"history":[{"period":"2016-03-01","rent":1074.214045},{"period":"2016-04-01","rent":1077.617269},{"period":"2016-05-01","rent":1082.971822},{"period":"2016-06-01","rent":1094.576261},{"period":"2016-07-01","rent":1096.273331},{"period":"2016-08-01","rent":1103.931921},{"period":"2016-09-01","rent":1113.867772},{"period":"2016-10-01","rent":1120.688324},{"period":"2016-11-01","rent":1124.383468},{"period":"2016-12-01","rent":1130.173328},{"period":"2017-01-01","rent":1152.098692},{"period":"2017-02-01","rent":1164.541637},{"period":"2017-03-01","rent":1181.103639},{"period":"2017-04-01","rent":1187.3068},{"period":"2017-05-01","rent":1191.992698},{"period":"2017-06-01","rent":1200.085526},{"period":"2017-07-01","rent":1208.987948},{"period":"2017-08-01","rent":1210.83214},{"period":"2017-09-01","rent":1217.062104},{"period":"2017-10-01","rent":1219.172802},{"period":"2017-11-01","rent":1240.544132},{"period":"2017-12-01","rent":1238.142711},{"period":"2018-01-01","rent":1233.330201},{"period":"2018-02-01","rent":1215.484818},{"period":"2018-03-01","rent":1222.208188},{"period":"2018-04-01","rent":1225.182332},{"period":"2018-05-01","rent":1233.390225},{"period":"2018-06-01","rent":1237.04249},{"period":"2018-07-01","rent":1238.965016},{"period":"2018-08-01","rent":1252.386608},{"period":"2018-09-01","rent":1254.768926},{"period":"2018-10-01","rent":1267.934967},{"period":"2018-11-01","rent":1263.011646},{"period":"2018-12-01","rent":1270.029224},{"period":"2019-01-01","rent":1270.935197},{"period":"2019-02-01","rent":1284.714936},{"period":"2019-03-01","rent":1288.147792},{"period":"2019-04-01","rent":1293.827332},{"period":"2019-05-01","rent":1295.953633},{"period":"2019-06-01","rent":1298.527586},{"period":"2019-07-01","rent":1304.421929},{"period":"2019-08-01","rent":1303.51739},{"period":"2019-09-01","rent":1308.619045},{"period":"2019-10-01","rent":1307.843571},{"period":"2019-11-01","rent":1312.31218},{"period":"2019-12-01","rent":1318.089502},{"period":"2020-01-01","rent":1326.835904},{"period":"2020-02-01","rent":1334.03807},{"period":"2020-03-01","rent":1333.656084},{"period":"2020-04-01","rent":1328.026852},{"period":"2020-05-01","rent":1322.459928},{"period":"2020-06-01","rent":1333.433911},{"period":"2020-07-01","rent":1350.668423},{"period":"2020-08-01","rent":1359.394803},{"period":"2020-09-01","rent":1357.773063},{"period":"2020-10-01","rent":1370.800135},{"period":"2020-11-01","rent":1397.059318},{"period":"2020-12-01","rent":1412.003838},{"period":"2021-01-01","rent":1418.659199},{"period":"2021-02-01","rent":1414.415791},{"period":"2021-03-01","rent":1432.369713},{"period":"2021-04-01","rent":1452.991575},{"period":"2021-05-01","rent":1472.893588},{"period":"2021-06-01","rent":1485.302713},{"period":"2021-07-01","rent":1493.340614},{"period":"2021-08-01","rent":1513.993079},{"period":"2021-09-01","rent":1535.147559},{"period":"2021-10-01","rent":1557.383808},{"period":"2021-11-01","rent":1573.847659},{"period":"2021-12-01","rent":1584.45235},{"period":"2022-01-01","rent":1594.545607},{"period":"2022-02-01","rent":1598.927629},{"period":"2022-03-01","rent":1610.215567},{"period":"2022-04-01","rent":1621.209656},{"period":"2022-05-01","rent":1644.542521},{"period":"2022-06-01","rent":1663.211078},{"period":"2022-07-01","rent":1675.126523},{"period":"2022-08-01","rent":1680.700688},{"period":"2022-09-01","rent":1688.170929},{"period":"2022-10-01","rent":1683.762945},{"period":"2022-11-01","rent":1677.832265},{"period":"2022-12-01","rent":1682.718988},{"period":"2023-01-01","rent":1695.753297},{"period":"2023-02-01","rent":1716.575307},{"period":"2023-03-01","rent":1731.628016},{"period":"2023-04-01","rent":1735.029507},{"period":"2023-05-01","rent":1726.235956},{"period":"2023-06-01","rent":1710.664535},{"period":"2023-07-01","rent":1708.988356},{"period":"2023-08-01","rent":1699.12765},{"period":"2023-09-01","rent":1690.282719},{"period":"2023-10-01","rent":1684.968024},{"period":"2023-11-01","rent":1672.935777},{"period":"2023-12-01","rent":1676.683656},{"period":"2024-01-01","rent":1673.57578},{"period":"2024-02-01","rent":1680.105604},{"period":"2024-03-01","rent":1671.93471},{"period":"2024-04-01","rent":1671.55602},{"period":"2024-05-01","rent":1676.279996},{"period":"2024-06-01","rent":1684.934353},{"period":"2024-07-01","rent":1689.624229},{"period":"2024-08-01","rent":1696.501678},{"period":"2024-09-01","rent":1707.505691},{"period":"2024-10-01","rent":1721.804506},{"period":"2024-11-01","rent":1731.556585},{"period":"2024-12-01","rent":1730.09649},{"period":"2025-01-01","rent":1725.341648},{"period":"2025-02-01","rent":1725.77398},{"period":"2025-03-01","rent":1726.192226},{"period":"2025-04-01","rent":1735.038423},{"period":"2025-05-01","rent":1730.989776},{"period":"2025-06-01","rent":1738.353791},{"period":"2025-07-01","rent":1739.281136},{"period":"2025-08-01","rent":1743.004935},{"period":"2025-09-0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