Living alone with a $2,000 housing budget may be nearly impossible in some major cities — but in others you may be able to afford up to three bedrooms.
Across the U.S., the average rent for a studio apartment listed on Apartments.com in October was $1,699 a month, and a two-bedroom space had an average rent of $1,887 per month, according to data collected and analyzed by Apartments.com in a November report.
Of the 25 most populous cities in the U.S., New York, Boston and California cities San Francisco, San Diego and San Jose were the most expensive. Average rent for a studio apartment in these cities was over $2,000 in October, according to data from Apartments.com shared with CNBC Make It.
With $2,000, you could get an average of 267 square feet in New York City, or one-third the size of a pickleball court, according to a normalized estimate from October listings. Compare that with Oklahoma City, the most affordable of the most populous cities, where $2,000 is worth about 1,900 square feet — more than two pickleball courts.
While this data offers a useful benchmark for comparison across cities, it isn’t necessarily indicative of the size of any single apartment a renter is likely to encounter. In reality, apartment sizes and prices can differ within the same city due to various factors, and renters should keep that in mind, the authors of the report said.
