New research has found the states with the lowest home vacancy rates, with Maine coming out on top. The study conducted by Texas real estate experts TexasRealEstateSource.com examined housing data from the US census for renter properties across the country to see which states had the lowest rates of vacant homes.
It found that the first place on the list went to the northeastern state of Massachusetts. The state has a rental vacancy rate of 2.8%, the lowest of any entry.
The state of Maine comes second on the list, with an average vacancy rate for rental properties sitting at just 2.9%
Utah takes third place on the list, with the southeastern state coming in with a vacancy rate of 3% for properties available for rent.
Taking fourth place on the list is Kentucky, which, for rental properties, has an average vacancy rate of 3.1%.
Rounding out the top five is the state of Montana, with a rental vacancy rate sitting at 3.3%.
| Rank | State | Average vacancy rate (rental properties) |
| 1 | Massachusetts | 2.8% |
| 2 | Maine | 2.9% |
| 3 | Utah | 3.0% |
| 4 | Kentucky | 3.1% |
| 5 | Montana | 3.3% |
| 6 | New York | 3.5% |
| 7 | California | 3.6% |
| 8 | Oregon | 3.8% |
| 9 | Colorado | 3.9% |
| — | Rhode Island | 3.9% |
| 10 | New Hampshire | 4.0% |
The study also looked at average vacancy rates for homeowner properties, with a lot lower overall vacancy rates. Maine and Tennessee tied for first place here, with a vacancy rate of 0.2%. Colorado and Virginia take a joint second at just 0.4% for their vacancy rates. Georgia, Kentucky, Maryland, Mississippi, New Hampshire, South Dakota, and Wisconsin also all had a homeowner vacancy rate of just 0.5%.
Commenting on the findings, a spokesperson for TexasRealEstateSource.com said: “What can be gathered from this data is the fact that rental properties have a larger percentage of vacancies than homeowner properties, with the percentage of vacant rental properties being more than three times higher in certain states. It’s also interesting to see that there isn’t necessarily a concentration of states where most properties are lived in, with the top ten featuring states from all over the US.”
TexasRealEstateSource.com, the one-stop source for Texas real estate, conducted this study.
