Portland Apartments Edge Houses on Long-Term Yield

Portland's short-term rental rules close off the Airbnb route for investment properties, so the real question for buyers here is not holiday-let versus long-term rental but house versus apartment within the long-term rental frame. Under that constraint, apartments tend to edge houses on gross yield because apartment entry prices drop further than monthly rents do, compressing the denominator in the yield calculation. Gross figures sit at roughly 3.5% for a standard 3-bed house citywide, and apartment yields generally track slightly higher before HOA fees. These are citywide medians across 33 ZIP codes; individual neighbourhoods diverge meaningfully from the central tendency.

Long-Term Rental Yields by Bedroom Count, House vs Apartment

City medians across 33 ZIP codes. Gross yields before HOA (apartments), property tax, and operating costs. Short-term rental columns omitted because non-owner-occupied short-term rentals are prohibited in Portland residential zones.

Why Apartments Show the Gross-Yield Edge

The price mechanism does the work. A 2-bed apartment sells for around $333,165 in Portland while a 2-bed house sits at $531,935, a sizeable gap. Monthly rent for that apartment runs around $1,341 against $1,658 for the house. The rent ratio is closer than the price ratio, so dividing rent by price tilts the result toward apartments. This is a structural feature of urban US condo stock, not a Portland quirk.

HOA fees narrow the effective gap. Budget roughly $3,706 per year for a 2-bed apartment before you see net income, though Portland spans a wide band. Modern Pearl District and South Waterfront towers with concierges, pools, fitness centres, and garages charge materially more. Older walk-ups in the eastside or Northwest carry lighter dues but can also hit owners with special assessments for siding, roofing, or seismic retrofits. The published gross yield in the table is before any of this.

There is also a rental-restriction risk layered on top of the city's short-term rental ban. Individual HOA boards can prohibit rentals entirely, cap the share of units that may be tenant-occupied, impose minimum lease terms, or require board approval of tenants. None of this shows up in price or rent data. Read the CC&Rs and current board rules, and request the most recent rental registry before making an offer. An apartment that cannot legally be rented is not an investment property, regardless of its yield on paper.

The Bedroom Count Curve

House yields generally compress as bedroom count rises. Purchase prices scale up faster than monthly rents when you go from a 2-bed house at $531,935 to a 4+ bed at $809,049. Larger houses attract family tenants who weigh school catchments and commute time more than square-foot efficiency, which caps how much the rent can stretch. The result is a flatter yield at the top of the house curve.

Apartments tell a similar story but across a narrower range. One-bed apartments dominate the rental pool in central Portland, so the 1-bed market is liquid and rents are closely benchmarked. Larger apartments thin out quickly: 3-bed apartments are a small slice of the downtown tower stock, and 4+ bed units are rare enough that the median can move on a handful of transactions. The 4+ bed category bundles 4, 5, and 6+ bedroom listings together, so treat that category as directional rather than precise.

Suburb Variation Across Portland's ZIP Codes

Citywide medians smooth over a real spread. Lents/Foster (97266) leads on yield at 6.6% with median prices around $407,000, while the lower-yielding central and west-side ZIPs sit several points below. Foster-Powell/Woodstock (97206) and Gateway/Glenfair (97233) show how inner-southeast neighbourhoods combine moderate entry prices with rents that have held up through the post-pandemic cycle. The dashboard shows suburb-level data for every bedroom count and property type, so you can compare within the specific area you are evaluating rather than relying on the citywide average.

View Portland in the dashboard → Free preview · every bedroom count and property type

What the Table Does Not Capture

• HOA fees: Estimated at around $3,706 per year for a 2-bed apartment in Portland, not deducted from the gross yields in the table above. Luxury towers run significantly higher. Special assessments for seismic work, siding, or elevator replacement can add four- or five-figure one-off hits.
• Capital appreciation: Houses usually outperform apartments on long-term value growth because you own the land. Portland land values in established inner-east and west-side neighbourhoods have compounded faster than condo price indices over the past two cycles.
• Renovation potential: Houses offer optionality such as extensions, ADU conversions, basement finishes, and pool additions that apartments cannot match. Portland's ADU-friendly zoning in particular makes this a lever worth pricing into a house purchase.
• Financing constraints: Some lenders restrict mortgages on small apartments (under 500 sq ft), on buildings with high investor-to-owner ratios, or on new construction where the developer still controls the HOA. Get financing pre-confirmed on the specific building before making an offer.
• 4+ bed data breadth: The 4+ bed category bundles 4, 5, and 6+ bedroom listings. A small number of outlier properties can pull the median in either direction, especially on the apartment side where stock is thin.

Portland in State and National Context

At $639,791 for a 3-bed house, Portland sits well above Oregon's state median of $404,967 and well above the US national median of $242,500. Rents are similarly elevated, but not by the same multiple, which is why the citywide gross yield of 4.5% sits below the national median of 5.3%. This is the classic premium-market profile: you are buying into a slower-yielding, higher-appreciation market rather than a cash-flow market. The house-versus-apartment decision in Portland therefore leans on how much weight you put on future capital growth relative to monthly net income. Houses win the appreciation argument; apartments win the cash-flow argument, at least on gross.

Investors whose thesis depends on short-term rental cash flow need to look outside Portland. Oregon allows local regulation of short-term rentals, and coastal Lincoln County, Central Oregon, and several rural counties run much more permissive regimes. Gross short-term rental yields in those markets can reach the high teens to mid-twenties on paper, though demand is seasonal and operations are more hands-on. The trade-off is appreciation: rural and small-town Oregon markets have not tracked Portland's long-term price growth.

See the data sources page for how Portland ZIP-level prices and rents are assembled, and the market score methodology for how regulation, yield, and demand feed into the long-term rental score of 7.5/10. Data reflects market conditions as of April 2026. For a bedroom-by-bedroom comparison in another market, the dashboard lets you run the same house-versus-apartment split across any US metro with different regulatory settings.

This information is for educational purposes only and should not be considered financial or legal advice. Regulations and market conditions change frequently. Verify current rules with local authorities before making investment decisions.