At 78258, Zillow’s current ZORI is $1,496, with the typical observed asking-rent index down 0.7% from a year earlier. ZORI is a ZIP-level asking-rent index blended across rental types, so it is a market indicator rather than a quote for a specific unit. The 78258 label 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. The immediate tension is a modestly lower asking-rent reading within an area whose broader resale indicators have not moved in the same direction.
The rent history classifies as cooling. Exact same-month change was negative over one year at 0.7% annually and over three years at 2.1% annually, while the five-year annualized change remained positive at 1.2%. That means the recent path breaks from, rather than confirms, the longer five-year rise. Monthly ZORI changes have shown 2.2% annualized variability, a relatively restrained level that supports some confidence in the direction of the current index reading. Still, the historical peak-to-trough drawdown reached 6.7%, so a single current snapshot should not be treated as a permanent level. The series has 100% coverage, and its transparent national discovery ranks are 2,660 for momentum, 324 for stability, and 1,915 for the balanced measure among history-eligible ZIPs. These are backward-looking measurements, not forecasts or investment recommendations.
The ACS 2024 five-year matched-ZCTA median gross rent was $1,736. This is not directly interchangeable with ZORI: ACS is a survey of occupied renter homes over a five-year period, and gross rent includes selected utilities, whereas ZORI tracks typical observed asking rents. The lower current ZORI reading can therefore indicate a different mix of available rental offerings, timing, and utility treatment rather than a definitive change in the costs faced by every occupied renter household. The ACS survey nature also means its estimates should be read as area-level measures rather than precise property-level facts.
Bedroom figures are modelled estimates rather than measured bedroom rents. Scaling ZIP ZORI through the local HUD ladder produces estimates of $1,126 for a studio, $1,233 for one bedroom, $1,496 for two bedrooms, $1,915 for three bedrooms, and $2,236 for four bedrooms. The corresponding HUD two-bedroom standard is $1,820. HUD FMR or SAFMR is an administrative, bedroom-specific standard rather than asking rent, and the modelled ladder does not establish that a particular apartment or house is available at these amounts. Its practical use is to put the blended ZORI into a transparent bedroom-size framework.
The arithmetic affordability screen is comparatively favorable against the area’s $117,835 median household income: annualizing the $1,496 ZORI implies $59,840 of income at a 30% rent-to-income screen, and the index equals 15.2% of the reported median household income before utilities or household-specific costs. This 30% screen is arithmetic, not advice and not an applicant qualification rule. Distribution remains important: among the estimated 8,820 renter-occupied homes in the ZCTA, 43.8% were rent burdened at 30% or more of income in the ACS measure. For wider context only, San Antonio city’s context rent is $1,382, Bexar County’s context rent is $1,389, and the San Antonio-New Braunfels metro context rent is $1,416; each is a broader geography, not a ZIP substitute.
The ACS housing-stock picture points to a mixed but predominantly single-family physical base. The ZCTA has 20,895 housing units and a 6.4% vacancy rate, with 559 vacant homes classified as for rent. There are 12,490 single-family units and 4,333 units in large multifamily structures. These counts describe the area’s stock and vacancy classifications, not the condition, rent level, lease terms, or immediate availability of any individual home. In particular, a vacant-for-rent designation cannot prove that a specific unit is rentable now, competitively priced, or suitable for a given household.
Redfin’s direct rolling-three-month ZIP resale observation belongs strictly to the for-sale market. It reports a $548,876 median sold price, up 4.6% year over year, with 182 homes sold and a 38-day median marketing time. Inventory was 233 homes and months of supply stood at 3.9. The average sale-to-list result was 98.8%, while 21.5% of sales closed above list price. These resale measures confirm that transactions were occurring while challenging a simplistic interpretation of the cooling rent history: sold prices rose even as ZORI declined. That contrast does not establish causation or property economics. Annualized ZIP ZORI divided by the median sold price is 3.27%, only a cross-source screening ratio rather than a measure of a property’s financial result.
The principal limits are source mismatch and aggregation. ZORI is an index across asking rentals, ACS describes occupied renter homes in a statistical ZCTA, HUD provides administrative bedroom standards, and Redfin records ZIP resale transactions rather than rental deals. Before using the figures for a specific property, a reader should verify current asking rents, bedroom count, included utilities, concessions, lease duration, unit condition, and actual availability. On the resale side, relevant property-level checks include recent comparable sales, list-price history, time on market, condition differences, and whether the subject’s transaction terms resemble the ZIP-wide sale-to-list signals. The unresolved question is whether a specific listing aligns with these broad indicators rather than merely sharing the 78258 label.