If you’re a renter, the market may be shifting in your favor.

As of December, the median asking rent price in the U.S. was $1,695, down 0.5% — or $8 — from November, according to a new report by Realtor.com.

The latest rent price is 1.1% lower — or $18 — from a year before, and down 3.7% from peak highs in July 2022.

Rental affordability is improving in part because of a “construction boom” of new apartment buildings during the pandemic, according to Daryl Fairweather, chief economist at Redfin.

“There are still units coming online now from projects that were started back in 2021, 2022,” she said.

With more new units available, some property managers are considering lowering their asking prices to attract tenants, experts say.

This means renters should have more negotiating power when it comes to the terms of their leases, Fairweather explained.

“We’re calling it a renter’s market. We think that’s going to continue for the next year,” she said.

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To be sure, the volume of newly built apartments is concentrated in some areas more than others, making rent prices decline faster in certain parts of the country.

By way of example, Austin, Texas, where the median rent is $1,394 as of December, saw some of the highest levels of multifamily housing construction over the past few years, according to Redfin. That figure is down from $1,482 in August when the median price fell 17.6% from a year prior.

Rents in Austin are likely to continue to fall as supply grows and demand balances itself out, experts say.

What you’re able to leverage as a renter will depend on what’s happening in your current market or where you plan to live.

Here are three key steps to consider if you’re on the rental market this year: 

Fees for amenities like a parking garage, a shared community space, an on-site fitness center or bike storage can range from $30 a month for basic offerings or one-time charges of $200 to $500, according to Apartment List.

If you see ads where other properties are calling out concessions like waived parking costs or reduced fees for an amenity, see if your landlord is willing to match that.

President Donald Trump has repeatedly discussed imposing tariffs, both on the campaign trail and since taking office — and the first tranche, on goods from Canada, China and Mexico will take effect Feb. 1, the White House confirmed on Friday.

While there are still some unknowns, one thing is clear, economists said: U.S. consumers should brace for a negative financial impact.

It’s “hard to find positives” from tariffs, said Mary Lovely, a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, whose research specializes in trade with China and global supply chains.

Trump plans to put 25% tariffs on Mexico and Canada, and a 10% duty on China, Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, said Friday.

China, Mexico and Canada are the three largest trading partners with the U.S., as measured by imported goods. They respectively supplied about $536 billion, $455 billion, and $437 billion of goods to the U.S. in 2022, according to the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative.

Tariffs are a tax on foreign imports. U.S. businesses pay that tax to the federal government.

Many businesses will funnel those extra costs to customers — either directly or indirectly — which is why tariffs generally trigger higher prices for consumers, economists said.

“Part of these tariffs will be passed on to consumers,” Lovely said.

Americans could also find they have fewer choices for brands and products stocked on store shelves, she said.

For example, it’s unclear if any imports will be exempt. Trump suggested this week, for example, that Canadian oil might be exempt. The White House said the tariffs will be open for public inspection on Saturday.

Discussions around such specifics are “ongoing,” a White House official told CNBC Friday morning.

“There are always exemptions and carve-outs,” said Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody’s.

Trump might try to “limit the damage to the U.S. consumer” via those exemptions, Zandi said. For example, he could choose not to impose duties on apparel from China, avocados from Mexico or cheese from Quebec, he said.

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A 25% Canada-Mexico tariff and 10% China tariff would raise about $1.3 trillion in revenue through 2035 on a net basis, the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget estimates. That revenue may be used to partially offset the cost of tax cuts, a package that might cost more than $5 trillion over 10 years.

However, a 10% additional tariff on China would shrink the U.S. economy by $55 billion during the Trump administration’s second term, assuming China retaliates with its own tariffs, according to an analysis by Warwick McKibbin and Marcus Noland, economists at the Peterson Institute for International Economics.

A 25% tariff on Mexico and Canada would cause a $200 billion reduction in U.S. gross domestic product, they found.

Meanwhile, economists expect more tariffs in the future.

On the campaign trail, Trump floated a 10% or 20% universal tariff on all imports and a tariff of at least 60% on Chinese goods, for example.

A 20% worldwide tariff and a 60% levy on Chinese goods would raise costs by $3,000 in 2025 for the average U.S. household, according to an October analysis by the Tax Policy Center.

“Broad-based, universal tariffs and the damage they will do is not really a debate,” Zandi said. “They will do damage. It’s just a question of how much and to whom.”

Tariffs on China would likely have such the largest direct impact on consumers — the bulk of what China exports to the U.S. is consumer goods like apparel, toys and electronics, Zandi said.

China is the “dominant supplier” of toys and sports equipment to the U.S., and provides 40% of its footwear imports, and 25% of its electronics and textiles, according to a recent analysis by PIIE economists.

Mexico and Canada tariffs would also “put upward pressure on food prices,” according to PIIE economists.

The nations are “important sources” of vegetables, accounting for 47% of total U.S. imports, and prepared foodstuffs (42%), for example. Transportation equipment and machinery, electronics and fuel are other sectors that stand to be most impacted, they found.

“The U.S. imports roughly 40% of its crude oil, with Canada as the dominant supplier,” Nigel Green, CEO of deVere Group, a financial consulting firm, said in a written statement.

“If oil is hit with tariffs, the impact could hit energy markets, pushing up costs for businesses and consumers,” Green wrote.

However, domestic energy producers, certain U.S. manufacturers and other industries “could see short-term gains from reduced competition,” he added.

Indirectly, U.S. producers might raise their prices because they face less foreign competition for certain goods, Lydia Cox, an assistant professor of economics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, said during a recent webinar.

U.S. companies that use tariffed goods to manufacture their products might also raise prices for downstream goods, Cox said. For example, steel tariffs might lead to higher prices for cars, heavy machinery and other products that use steel.

“Unlike Canada and Mexico, for which retaliation would be inconceivable, China has retaliated in the past and would likely do so again,” PIIE economists wrote recently.

Further, tariffs may have the unintended consequence of destroying jobs, economists said.

Their ability to create U.S. jobs is “vastly, vastly overstated,” said Lovely of PIIE.

Take steel, for example. There are 80 workers in jobs in industries that use steel as an input for every one job that produces steel, Cox found in a recent paper.

Tariffs create “a lot of collateral damage along the way,” which is why economists warn against broad-based use, Cox said.

From Billie Eilish and Sabrina Carpenter to Kendrick Lamar and SZA, 2025 promises to be another big year for live music events. That may also mean concert-goers will be shelling out more for their favorite shows.

After rising steadily post-pandemic, admission to movies, theaters, and concerts jumped 20% since 2021, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ consumer price index data.

And yet, consumers have demonstrated a high tolerance for the increasing price tag, also known as “funflation.”

Concert goers attended an average of seven shows in 2024, and most plan to see more in 2025, according to a recent report by CouponCabin.

The survey of more than 1,000 music fans in December found that nearly 36% said they will spend $100 to $499 on concert tickets in 2025, while over 17% plan to spend up to $1,000.

After testing new limits in 2024, Americans proved a willingness to splurge — even travel abroad — to catch shows like Taylor Swift’s Era Tour, bringing so-called “passion tourism” into the spotlight, some experts say.

Younger adults, particularly Generation Z and millennials, have even said they would go into debt to pursue some of these experiences, other recent reports show.

Nearly two out of five Gen Z and millennial travelers have spent up to $5,000 on tickets alone for destination live events, one recent study from Bread Financial found.

“Dynamic pricing” is partly to blame for the escalating price tag, according to Joe Bennett, a forensic musicologist at Berklee College of Music.

Originally coined by economists in the late 1920s, dynamic pricing refers the charging of a higher price at a time of greater demand. Consumers often associate it with shifting airline ticket prices or how ride-hailing services adjust fares at busy times, Bennett said.

“We all know that if you are looking for an Uber or Lyft, there are certain times of night when it’s more expensive. The market seems to have adapted to that,” he said. “But concert tickets were generally a fixed price.”

That’s no longer the case. And now there is heightened awareness — and controversy — around the practice when it comes to buying highly sought-after event tickets.

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How and when dynamic pricing is used is at the discretion of the artist or management, according to Andrew Mall, an associate professor of music at Northeastern University — and it is often determined under the radar.

However, with so many recent high-profile tours, “for sure, dynamic pricing has surged to the forefront of concert goers’ attention,” he recently told CNBC.

Ticketmaster is under investigation in the U.K. for its recent use of dynamic pricing in sales of reunion concerts from Britpop band Oasis.

Many Oasis fans took to social media to complain that they ended up paying more than double the face value of the ticket without warning. The band said it would abandon the practice for the North American leg of its tour.

Taylor Swift reportedly refused to dynamically price her Eras Tour tickets because “she didn’t want to do that to her fans,” Jay Marciano, chairman and CEO of AEG Presents, which promoted the event, told HITS Daily Double in October.

Throughout the 21^st century, revenue from recorded music has gone down while revenue from live music events has gone up. By the mid-2000s, concerts “provided a larger source of income for performers than record sales or publishing royalties,” economist Alan Krueger wrote in a paper on the economic issues and trends in the rock and roll industry.

Live music industry revenue jumped 25% in 2023 alone, according to data from Statista.

Ticketmaster in 2011 first introduced an early version of dynamic ticket pricing, which is now the standard for live music ticketing sales.

In more recent years, “ticket sales went crazy” driven by post-pandemic pent-up demand and a surge in mega-star stadium tours, Bennett said.

“You can see why it’s tempting,” he said. “The live music industry is constantly leaving money on the table that fans would pay. Dynamic pricing is sort of a capitalist inevitability given the forces at play, but I don’t want to live in a world where it costs $1,000 for my daughter to see Taylor Swift.”

Still, it’s now common for ticket-selling platforms to charge more per ticket depending on demand for the event at any given time — whether consumers like it or not, according to Matt Schulz, LendingTree’s chief credit analyst.

“It’s not very popular, as you might imagine,” Schulz said. “Businesses and musicians are trying to see what the market will bear, and it makes things really difficult for the consumer.”

“Our research consistently tells us that concerts are a top priority for discretionary spending, and one of the last experiences fans will cut back on,” Live Nation said in a quarterly earnings call in 2023. 

But as consumers continue to spare no expense to see their favorite artist or group, that means that means dynamic pricing is here to stay, at least for now.

“The live music sector has been leaning into this attitude for a long time,” Northeastern University’s Mall said.

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