The cost of renting in Anne Arundel County has increased more over the last decade than in any other Maryland jurisdiction, a Banner analysis of recently released U.S. Census Bureau data found.

Between 2014 to 2024, gross rent, which includes rent and utilities, soared 9.5% in the county after adjusting for inflation, compared with 4.6% statewide.

The typical Anne Arundel renter paid $2,119 a month in rent and utilities last year, on par with Howard and Montgomery counties for the most expensive in the state.

So why does renting cost so much in Anne Arundel?

As the county became a popular place to live on the Chesapeake Bay between the job hubs of Washington and Baltimore, housing hasn’t kept up. There’s simply not enough housing, particularly moderately or affordably priced apartments, elected officials and experts told The Banner.

They attribute that to a history of unfriendly housing policies, negative attitudes towards higher-density housing and a stubbornly slow process for issuing building permits.

“Our permits for new construction are at historic lows. That slow growth is catching up to us,” said County Councilwoman Julie Hummer, a Democrat who represents the western part of the county. “More inventory — it may not lower the cost of rentals, but it could halt the increase.”

Only 33 rental units in the county were listed under $2,000 per month as of Oct. 20, said Greg Fisk, regional manager with Douglas Realty and immediate past president of the Anne Arundel County Association of Realtors. Most of those, he said, were one-bedroom units that would require earning about $80,000 a year to afford it.

“The unaffordability of it is staggering,” Fisk said.

Anne Arundel has taken steps to stem the housing crisis.

Hummer and Councilwoman Allison Pickard, a Glen Burnie Democrat, highlighted three measures:

• a law that requires developments over 10 units to designate 10% of units as “moderately priced.”
• a law that allows developers to build more than zoning allows if they include residences for the county’s essential workforce.
• a law that encourages redeveloping run-down commercial properties with housing.

“We’ve done a tremendous amount since 2018 compared to the decades before,” Pickard said. “We have persevered over the last seven years in some ways in representing that silent voice that aren’t in the chambers banging their fists on the table giving their two minutes of testimony: ‘Not in our backyard.’”

Those reforms, however, cannot change the housing stock immediately.

“Any time you have bills with development, you don’t see the fruits right away,” Hummer said.

There’s also a deep-rooted negative perception about affordable or high-density housing in the county, said Max Gross, government affairs director for the Realtors association. Whenever there is a large-scale proposal, “people who show up to meetings are generally more opposed,” Gross said.

Some council members kowtow to their loudest constituents.

All of the council’s Republicans carved their districts out from the sweeping redevelopment bill.

When a proposed redevelopment of a former Glen Burnie bus depot included housing priced for the likes of nurses, teachers and emergency responders, outraged neighbors took their concerns to their councilman. Republican Nathan Volke unsuccessfully pursued a bill to limit such development countywide.

But introducing such legislation can have a chilling effect.

“By even having that conversation, it’s telling builders: ‘You can’t plan on anything because we might change the rules on you,’” Gross said. “I’ve heard that from a lot of people in this industry that there’s a lot of unpredictability in this market. … A lot of people have stopped trying.”

Pickard added that very little county land is zoned to allow apartments. Its 533 miles of shoreline are a draw, but also feature environmental regulations that restrict building.

That’s visible in the county’s persistent 1-2% vacancy rate for apartments, which amounts to “a supply issue that drives up the rents,” she said.

Gross said the county’s builders largely focus on higher-end apartments.

The county also has a high share of large rental units, the census data shows. Around 40% of renter-occupied units have three or more bedrooms, compared with 30% statewide.

“If we’re not building a ton of new apartment buildings, developers, landlords, are going to be able to charge what the market can bear,” said Nick Finio, associate director of the University of Maryland’s National Center for Smart Growth. “They can increase rents up to what they think people will pay. In Anne Arundel, people are clearly willing to pay pretty high rent.”

More than 2 in 5 renting households in the county were cost-burdened last year, meaning they spent 30% or more of their income on rent, census data shows. About half of those, or 1 in 5 renting households, were severely cost-burdened, meaning they spent 50% or more on rent.

As of 2022, 58% of households could afford the average-priced home in Anne Arundel, down from 70% in 2000, Finio said.

“Literally, fewer people can afford home ownership, which means they have to stay in the rental market,” Finio said. “What that means is there’s more competition in the rental market.”

Then there’s the permitting process.

Pickard said it can take up to six years for developers to complete the permitting process in Anne Arundel.

“Time is money” to builders, she said, and “we’ve seen regional and smaller builders leaving the county.”

Linda Hanifin Bonner, affordable housing chair for Anne Arundel Connecting Together, a coalition of faith-based groups, said each county department “works in a silo” when reviewing permits, prolonging the process.

A housing report recently released by Maryland Comptroller Brooke Lierman found that Maryland is losing residents to states with lower housing costs.

Bonner attributes the increased cost of housing to the costs of regulations in Anne Arundel and across Maryland.

Rising rents have nearly caught up with the cost of homeownership in the county, the census data shows.

The typical Anne Arundel homeowner spent around $2,441 a month on costs including a mortgage, taxes, insurance and utilities last year. That ranked near the top five among Maryland counties.

The gap between the median cost of owning and renting was $3,900 a year, the smallest in the state.

Do experts think it’s better to buy than rent in Anne Arundel?

Some in real estate think so.

Agents typically encourage people to look into buying because “housing prices generally don’t go down,” Gross said.

But the high cost of rent can be a hurdle for prospective homebuyers saving up for a down payment, he added.

“Even if the cost makes sense, there’s still a supply and inventory shortage,” Gross said.