San Francisco Rents Are Up 25.4 Percent by Zumper and 2.6 Percent by BLS. The Gap Is Who Is Moving

The Bureau of Labor Statistics rent index for the San Francisco metro area rose 2.6 percent in the 12 months to September 2026. Zumper's September report put the city's median one-bedroom asking rent at $4,400, up 25.4 percent over the same stretch. That is a gap of nearly tenfold, and neither number is wrong.

Same city, five answers

The 25 percent headline that went viral this week traces to Zumper, a listing marketplace. SFGate reported on October 20 that San Francisco rents are up 25 percent in a year and that a two-bedroom has passed $6,000 a month for the first time, according to Zumper. Zumper's September national report has that two-bedroom at $6,340, up 26.8 percent. Other measures of the same city disagree widely.

• BLS rent of primary residence, San Francisco area, September 2026 against September 2025: index 535.176 versus 521.377, up 2.6 percent.
• Zillow's Observed Rent Index, as used in a SmartAsset study of February data: $3,830 against $3,362, up 13.94 percent, the largest rise among the 100 largest cities.
• Zumper, June 2026: one-bedroom median $4,060, up 21.9 percent, per a CRE Daily summary of that report.
• Zumper, September 2026: one-bedroom median $4,400, up 25.4 percent.
• Zumper's San Francisco page on October 21: one-bedroom average $4,413, up 30 percent, but down 1 percent in the last 30 days. The two-bedroom average, $6,245, was up 25 percent and down 2 percent over the month.

The last item matters. The monthly figures show asking rents slipping in the most recent weeks, even as the annual comparison sits near 30 percent. A year-over-year number from a fast-rising stretch can stay high for months after the climb stops.

Thirty-six apartments and a $250 bump

Sonja Mihailovic is a cell therapy scientist who works in South San Francisco. She searched for six months and contacted at least 36 places, according to SFGate. At one Inner Sunset home, the landlord raised the rent $250 above the listed price because of what the message called an unexpectedly strong response. The same home rented for $1,500 less in 2024. She posted about it on Reddit under the title "This housing market is insane," and the thread passed 1.5 million views in three days.

Her story fits the Zumper number, not the BLS one. She was a mover. Someone who signed a lease in 2023 and stayed is in the 2.6 percent group, minus whatever the landlord is allowed to add. Who wins and who loses is set by tenure, not by income alone: long-term tenants in rent-controlled units and owners of vacant units sit on opposite sides of a 23-point spread.

What the BLS number can miss

The BLS figure has limits. It covers the San Francisco-Oakland-Hayward metro area, not the city, so it blends in places where rents rose less. It also samples rents on existing leases, which reprice slowly. Zumper's data is a flow of new listings, which is where a turn in the market would show first. Marcus & Millichap's second-quarter report describes Class A rent growth above 13 percent year over year in four submarkets and a central business district vacancy rate in the 3 percent range.

There is also a national baseline. Zumper's national one-bedroom median was $1,518 in September, up 0.1 percent. The SmartAsset study found the average rent across 100 large cities rose 1.73 percent, and the next-largest city increase after San Francisco was 6.5 percent. By either measure the city is an outlier.

The policy gap

Mayor Daniel Lurie declared a rent emergency on September 10 and unveiled six ordinances and more than $30 million in spending. "We have lived through booms before," he said in the city's announcement. The items on sf.gov go at evictions and at increases on sitting tenants: $3 million more for tenant legal counsel, a 25 percent rise in Ellis Act relocation payments, and a 10 percent cap on banked increases and capital improvement charges for rent-controlled tenants. None of them is a limit on asking rents for vacant units, which is where the 25 percent sits.

SFGate reports eviction notices are on pace for a decade high, up 44 percent this year. The city's own announcement says more than 1,000 notices have been filed, roughly a quarter for nonpayment. Neither source says how many tenants were forced out. The next BLS San Francisco release, covering October, is due November 10, and it will show whether the 2.6 percent is starting to move toward the listings.