Washington, Dc Rent Report: November 2026

Welcome to the Apartment List November 2026 Rent Report for Washington, DC. Currently, the overall median rent in the city stands at $2,169, roughly the same as last month. Prices remain up 0.1% year-over-year. Read on to learn more about what’s been happening in the Washington, DC rental market and how it compares to trends throughout the broader Washington, Dc metro area and the nation as a whole.

The median rent in Washington, DC fell by 0.3% over the course of October, and has now increased by a total of 0.1% over the past 12 months. Washington, DC’s rent growth over the past year has is similar to the national average (0.1%).

Ten months into the year, rents in Washington, DC have risen 4.5%. This is a faster rate of growth compared to what the city was experiencing at this point last year: from January to October 2025 rents had increased 0.1%.

Washington, DC rents went down 0.3% in the past month, compared to the national rate of -0.3%. Among the nation's 100 largest cities, this ranks #52. Similar monthly rent growth took place in Arlington, TX (-0.3%) and St. Petersburg, FL (-0.3%).

Citywide, the median rent currently stands at $2,144 for a 1-bedroom apartment and $2,201 for a 2-bedroom. Across all bedroom sizes (ie, the entire rental market), the median rent is $2,169. That ranks #15 in the nation, among the country's 100 largest cities.

For comparison, the median rent across the nation as a whole is $1,215 for a 1-bedroom, $1,369 for a 2-bedroom, and $1,384 overall. The median rent in Washington, DC is 56.7% higher than the national, and is similar to the prices you would find in Santa Ana, CA ($2,243) and Los Angeles, CA ($2,083).

If we expand our view to the wider Washington, DC metro area, the median rent is $2,165 meaning that the median price in Washington, DC proper ($2,169) is 0.2% greater than the price across the metro as a whole. Metro-wide annual rent growth stands at -0.1%, below the rate of rent growth within just the city.

The table below shows the latest rent stats for 30 cities in the Washington, DC metro area that are included in our database. Among them, Lorton is currently the most expensive, with a median rent of $2,756. Frederick is the metro’s most affordable city, with a median rent of $1,665. The metro's fastest annual rent growth is occurring in Forestville (5.5%) while the slowest is in Silver Spring (-2.0%).

Apartment List is committed to the accuracy and transparency of our rent estimates. We begin with reliable median rent statistics from the Census Bureau, then extrapolate them forward to the current month using a growth rate calculated from our listing data. In doing so, we use a same-unit analysis similar to Case-Shiller’s approach, capturing apartment transactions over time to provide an accurate picture of rent growth in cities across the country. Our approach corrects for the sample bias inherent in other private sources, producing results that are much closer to statistics published by the Census Bureau and HUD. For more details, please see the Apartment List Rent Estimate Methodology.

Apartment List publishes monthly rent reports and underlying data for hundreds of cities across the nation, as well as data aggregated for counties, metros, and states. These data are intended to be a source of reliable information that help renters and policymakers make sound decisions. Insights from our data are covered regularly by journalists across the country. To access the data yourself, please visit our Data Downloads Page.