Alaska rent growth slows overall, but Mat-Su and Kenai post record jumps

The median rent for a two-bedroom unit, plus utilities, rose 2.6% across the areas surveyed by the Alaska Department of Labor and Workforce Development, the smallest increase in five years, according to the department's spring rental survey, published in the September Alaska Economic Trends.

Some areas saw much bigger jumps. Two-bedroom rent in the Matanuska-Susitna Borough rose 12.8% to $1,567, and in the Kenai Peninsula Borough it rose 11% to $1,336, department economist Gunnar Schultz wrote. Both were record increases. In Juneau, the typical two-bedroom rent rose 2.8% to $1,708, while one-bedroom rents there climbed about 13%.

A separate count looks at the lowest-income renters. The National Low Income Housing Coalition counts 17,194 extremely low-income renter households in Alaska and 6,002 rental homes affordable and available to them, a deficit of 11,192 units. The group says 81% of those households are cost burdened and 68% are severely cost burdened.