See what $1,700 in rent can get you across Philly
This budget can get up to 1,500 square feet of apartment space in the Northeast. It'll get you as little as 211 in Manhattan. Philly has some of the largest $1,700 apartments in the Northeast U.S.
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Paying $1,700 a month in rent may get you a spacious home or a shoebox, depending on where you live.
In Philadelphia, it could mean a roughly 1,500-square-foot apartment in the Northeast or less than 500 square feet in West Philadelphia. In New York, it could mean 566 square feet in Upper Manhattan or just over 200 square feet in Lower Manhattan, where renters’ $1,700 per month buys the least space in the country.
That’s according to an analysis by the national apartment search website RentCafe of average rents and apartment sizes by zip code across the 50 largest U.S. cities. A $1,700 monthly budget can buy 944 square feet on average. RentCafe based its analysis on an estimate of the national average rent this fall.
» READ MORE: The average Philly renter could afford to buy up to 1,500 square feet with their rent
In the Northeast region of the United States, six zip codes offer renters more than 1,000 square feet of apartment space for $1,700 — and they’re all in Philadelphia.
The median asking rent for a two-bedroom apartment in December in the city was $1,720, according to the rental listing website Zumper.
Generally, the farther an apartment is from Center City — Philadelphia’s fastest growing residential area for the last two decades — the more space it provides for $1,700 in rent.
» READ MORE: Here’s how much Philly-area buyers are paying per square foot for a new home
Of 1,665 zip codes that RentCafe analyzed, the 30 where renters get the least space for $1,700 are in New York. In these places, the largest apartment is 290 square feet and the smallest is 211.
Southern and Midwestern states offer some of the biggest apartments for $1,700. That budget goes the furthest in a section of Memphis that borders Mississippi. In that zip code, renters can get an apartment stretching just shy of 2,000 square feet.
Where renters can get the most and least space in Philly
The 19135 zip code that covers the Tacony and Wissinoming neighborhoods offers the most space for Philadelphia renters who can afford to pay $1,700 per month — 1,499 square feet.
Renters can find the second-most space in the 19153 zip code in Eastwick and the surrounding area in Southwest Philadelphia. There, a rent of $1,700 can pay for 1,231 square feet.
On the other end of the spectrum, just west of Center City in the 19104 zip code that covers University City, Mantua, and Powelton, renters can get the least amount of apartment space for $1,700 — 481 square feet.
The next smallest apartment space for that price can be found in the 19102 zip code in Center City — 519 square feet.
» READ MORE: University City apartment boom continues with 350 more units planned at 40th & Market
Six Philadelphia zip codes, including 19137 (Bridesburg and Port Richmond), 19148 (eastern part of South Philadelphia), and 19142 (a section of Southwest Philadelphia), didn’t have enough data for RentCafe’s analysis, so they were excluded.
Other cities with the most and least space
Across the country, renters can get the most space for $1,700 in areas of Memphis; Oklahoma City; Kansas City, Mo.; Tulsa, Okla.; and San Antonio, Texas. Apartment sizes in zip codes in these cities range from 1,996 square feet to 1,837 square feet.
Beyond the crunch of New York, areas of Boston and San Francisco made it onto the list of the 50 zip codes with the least space. Apartment renters in these areas can’t get more than 350 square feet for $1,700.