Apartment communities are seeing a boost in high income-earning resident applicants.

A growing number of wealthier new renters come from the millennial generation, who are driving the burgeoning lifestyle-renting market. At the same time, many would-be buyers are bowing out of the residential real estate market, trends are showing, according to RentCafe.

Investors can’t take their eyes off of the Western and Southeast U.S. apartment markets.

Multifamily investment activity has roared back after “a couple of weak quarters” during the pandemic, said Richard Barkham, global chief economist and head of Americas research at CBRE said at the recent GlobeSt.com Multifamily conference.

The fourth quarter typically is a month for apartment rents to fall, or at least cool a bit. Not this year. The multifamily housing industry continues to defy trends, and also continues to march higher, according to recent data from RealPage.