4 Things Almost No One Considers When Deciding to Rent a House vs. an Apartment

If you’re a renter looking for a new place to live (and don’t live in a dense, big city like New York City), you’ll generally have both houses and apartments to choose from in your journey for a new home. But how do you choose between renting a house vs. an apartment?

Houses and apartments both come in different sizes, styles, and price ranges, so how should you determine what’s best for you? We talked with a couple of renters across the United States about the pros and cons of renting both houses and apartments, as well as other factors you should keep in mind when making this important choice.

Houses are obviously bigger than apartments, which can be great, but they can also come with increased responsibilities. “When renting a house, at least in Washington, D.C., where I lived at the time, tenants are responsible for taking care of yard work and often have to keep track of external repairs that wouldn’t be an issue with an apartment — think: lawn maintenance, tree trimming, clogged gutters, [and] snow shoveling,” Katie Ozog explains, who currently rents an apartment in New York City but has rented houses in several states across the country. 

“I also liked living in a real house because we had multiple floors with clearly delineated common space,” she adds. “Our rooms were all on the second floor or in the attic, which meant going upstairs felt like a retreat from social time.”

Both Katie and Ali Aoun, another renter we spoke with, said their rented houses came with the standard array of appliances, although Ali’s washer was broken, which wasn’t communicated until after move-in. They also agreed that renting a house was actually cheaper than any apartment for them, but this was largely because they had roommates.

“Another big difference with living in a house, at least in my experience, was the stuff people leave behind when they move out,” adds Katie. “The neighborhood where I lived has a rich history of rental houses that were usually shared by artists, activists, punk musicians, etc. I could write a book about the weird items and strange lore that accumulated after the decades of roommate roulette.”

Apartments tend to be smaller than houses, and then there’s the whole thing where you’re sharing the building with anywhere from a few to a few hundred other tenants.

Living in proximity to that many people has its pros and cons. It’s never ideal to learn you’re sharing a wall with a stranger who loudly watches Friends on repeat at sunrise, but you could also find community in your neighbors, which can come in handy if there are building-wide issues like lack of heat or a broken elevator.

“If something’s wrong in the building, multiple tenants are affected,” Ali says. “That’s kinda what I liked about an apartment; landlords have more of an incentive to act fast, whereas with [a] house, if my heat wasn’t working it would take a little longer to get someone in.”

On his blog, longtime Massachusetts-based real estate agent Bill Gassett also notes that apartments tend to be less likely to allow pets, offer parking spaces, and permit modifications of the property. If those are things that really matter to you, you may want to consider looking at houses, which are more likely to have outdoor space, too.

On the flip side, apartments sometimes include amenities like a gym or a doorman, and they tend to be in more walkable areas. Utilities are usually also cheaper than they’d be in a house, as you’re generally in a smaller space. 

Most people want their homes to be a place of peace and quiet, at least some of the time. Although it might seem like houses would come out on top here — you’re not sharing walls with strangers, for example — there actually isn’t one clear winner, especially if you’re a renter.

For Ali, the “biggest difference” he experienced renting a house compared to an apartment was “the privacy and the space. Not having to worry about noise, and also having so much room. That felt really good,” he says.

However, he also noted that he felt more security in an apartment, “because there are other people in the building. I know privacy was a bonus for the house, but also if someone breaks into the house, you’re alone.”

On the other hand, Katie found her apartment experience to be more private because she was able to live in a studio apartment alone, as opposed to houses where she was renting alongside as many as five other people. (It’s pricey to rent a whole house if you’re just one person!)

When it comes to applying for a lease and dealing with landlords, houses and apartments both vary quite a bit depending on factors like who owns the property and where it’s located. Ali rented his house while attending college in Michigan, and says most apartment buildings in the area were owned by companies, which often involved long, impersonal application processes, tougher competition, and bigger fees.

“The differences end up being more about whether it’s owned by a corporation versus a person,” Ali notes. Both his and Katie’s house-renting experiences largely involved landlords who were individuals or couples, which they said generally made for simpler, more flexible lease proceedings. 

One of Katie’s former houses was run by a leasing company, however, and she says she “played the middleman more times than I can count during disputes with the company, various tenants, neighbors, and the actual owners.”

One rather specific perk of knowing your landlord? “We had bat problems; literal bats would fly into the living room, which was terrifying,” says Ali. “But it was nice to have the landlord on speed dial so they could come over right away and take care of it.”