Columbus rents and rental comps

The median asking rent across Columbus, OH sits at $1,509/month, pulled from active rental listings in 16 zip codes. That's down 2.0% from a year ago.

Rents aren't uniform across the city. ZIP 43201 tops the list at $1,850/month. ZIP 43224 comes in lowest at $1,100/month. That's a 68% spread between the top and bottom zip codes, which is wide. City-wide averages won't tell you much about a specific property here.

A 2-bedroom rents for $1,245/month at the median. 1-bedrooms run about $995. 3-bedrooms come in around $1,750.

Listings take longer here. The average is 53 days on market, which gives renters more room to negotiate and means landlords should price carefully.

Rent-to-price math is tight in Columbus. The gross figure sits at about 6.1% ($1,509/month against $297,450 median price). Most investors here are betting on appreciation, not monthly cash flow.

HUD's Fair Market Rent for a 2-bedroom in the Columbus metro is $2,150/month. Asking rents come in about 30% below the federal benchmark, which can make Section 8 properties competitive here.

Columbus is the rare Midwest city that's growing. Ohio State brings a massive student and employee base. A tech scene has expanded around it. Then there's Intel, which is building a chip fabrication facility nearby that brings billions in investment and thousands of jobs. Short North, German Village, and Grandview Heights are premium. Franklinton has been gentrifying. Columbus gives you Midwest affordability with growth characteristics that look more like a Sun Belt market. The Intel project alone should drive rental demand on the east side of the metro for years. Worth paying attention to.

These numbers are city-wide averages. If you're pricing a specific property in Columbus, pull comps from the same zip code. The spread is usually bigger than people expect.