Here are 10 cities where American renters want to move

One measure of a hot rental market is how many people search its apartment listings from out of town.

And by that metric, Hartford, Connecticut, is one of the hottest rental markets in America. So are New Orleans, Salt Lake City, Utah, and Raleigh, North Carolina.

A new report from Zillow lists the large metropolitan areas with the most rental interest coming from out-of-towners, as measured by Zillow searches.

Rental search trends “are an early signal of migration trends,” Zillow says in the report. When lots of out-of-towners are searching rental listings in Providence, Rhode Island, or Richmond, Virginia, Zillow says, “it often points to a developing pipeline of incoming renters.”

Eight metropolitan areas draw half or more of rental interest from out of town, as of July 2026, according to Zillow’s analysis. Some, like Raleigh and Nashville, are well-established boomtowns. Others, like New Orleans and Salt Lake City, are not considered highly competitive housing markets. The analysis covers the nation's 50 largest metro areas by population.

“I think something they almost all have in common is that they have a value proposition in terms of affordability,” with relatively modest rents for apartments and homes, said Mischa Fisher, chief economist…

Original source: https://www.usatoday.com/money/