Massachusetts has the second-most expensive rent in the country, and it also has a data quirk that changes how every county figure on this page should be read.
HUD defines Massachusetts fair market rent areas by TOWN, not by county. In 44 states HUD publishes a figure for each county. In the six New England states it does not — it publishes town-level areas instead, because New England's town governments are the meaningful administrative unit and its counties frequently are not.
Which means there is no HUD county figure for Massachusetts. The county numbers below are medians across each county's towns, computed by this site and flagged as aggregates — not HUD's own publication.
The statewide two-bedroom is $2,067.
A note before you start. This is general education, not housing, legal or financial advice. Rent figures come from HUD's Fair Market Rents for FY2026, published under 24 CFR 888.113 and used to set Housing Choice Voucher payment standards. An FMR is the 40th percentile of GROSS rent — rent plus tenant-paid utilities — for standard-quality units in a defined rent area, so roughly 60% of units cost more. County figures for Massachusetts are this site's medians across HUD's town-level areas, not HUD county publications. Take-home figures are computed by this site's own tax engine for tax year 2026 on a single filer. Massachusetts landlord-tenant law is outside this dataset.
1. What HUD says renting costs in Massachusetts
| Unit size | Statewide fair market rent |
|---|---|
| Studio | $1,463 |
| 1 bedroom | $1,592 |
| 2 bedroom | $2,067 |
| 3 bedroom | $2,555 |
| 4 bedroom | $2,846 |
Every one of those is second in the country behind Hawaii, and the statewide two-bedroom is 6% above third-placed New Hampshire and New Jersey at $1,950.
The studio at $1,463 is higher than the two-bedroom figure in 30 states. That is the useful way to hold Massachusetts's position: the cheapest unit type here costs more than the mid-sized unit type in most of the country.
Work out what rent your own income actually supports in Massachusetts2. Towns, not counties, and why it matters
HUD's fair market rent areas in Massachusetts are defined by town. There is no published HUD figure for Middlesex County or Worcester County as such.
Three consequences, and the third is the one that matters most:
Any county-level Massachusetts rent figure you see is somebody's aggregation. Including the ones on this page. This site computes a median across each county's towns and flags it; a source that presents a Massachusetts county rent as HUD's own number is misdescribing it.
Within-county variation is genuinely large. Massachusetts counties contain towns in different rent areas, sometimes very different ones. A county median therefore conceals more here than in a state where HUD publishes county figures directly.
And the town boundary is the operative line, not the county boundary. Two houses a mile apart in different towns can sit in different rent areas with different published figures. In most of the country the equivalent line is a county border; in Massachusetts it is a town line, and there are 351 of them.
This is the single most important methodological caveat about New England rent data, and it applies equally in Connecticut, Rhode Island, New Hampshire, Vermont and Maine.
3. The spread, and the floor that is not a floor
| Measure | Massachusetts |
|---|---|
| Distinct rent areas | 20 |
| Cheapest 2-bedroom area | $1,527 |
| Dearest 2-bedroom area | $3,138 |
| Internal spread | 106% |
| Statewide median | $2,067 |
The cheapest rent area in Massachusetts is $1,527. That figure is higher than the statewide median two-bedroom in 44 states.
Massachusetts has no rent area at $973 — unlike Texas, New York, Georgia, Florida and thirteen other states, where that administered minimum appears across large stretches of rural geography. There is nowhere cheap in Massachusetts by national standards, which is a genuinely different situation from a state whose statewide median is dragged down by rural areas at the minimum.
The internal spread of 106% is moderate. The dearest area is roughly double the cheapest, against California's near-four-to-one.
4. Three things a fair market rent is not
It is the 40th percentile, not the median. Roughly 60% of standard-quality units rent for more than the FMR.
It is GROSS rent, including tenant-paid utilities. HUD builds the figure to cover rent plus the utilities a tenant pays. In Massachusetts's older housing stock heating costs are substantial and frequently tenant-paid, so the difference between a heat-included rent and one without is larger here than in a warm-winter state.
It is per rent area, not per county — and in Massachusetts per TOWN. See section 2.
5. What the two-bedroom actually requires
Most US landlords screen on gross income being at least three times the annual rent.
| Statewide | Middlesex County | Worcester County | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2-bedroom | $2,067 | $2,941 | $2,056 |
| Gross income a 3x screen demands | $74,412 | $105,876 | $74,016 |
$105,876 to rent a median two-bedroom in Middlesex County — and that is HUD's 40th percentile, so about 60% of Middlesex two-bedrooms cost more.
What passing that screen leaves
| Statewide 2-bed | |
|---|---|
| Gross income required | $74,412 |
| Massachusetts take-home, single filer | About $57,678 |
| Take-home per month | $4,807 |
| Rent | $2,067 |
| Rent as a share of take-home | 43.0% |
Someone who exactly passes a Massachusetts landlord's income screen is spending 43.0% of what reaches their account on rent.
| State | Rent as % of take-home at exactly 3x gross |
|---|---|
| Hawaii | 44.7% |
| Oregon | 43.1% |
| Massachusetts | 43.0% |
| Texas | 38.6% |
| North Dakota | 38.2% |
The 3x rule never lands on 30% in any state. Massachusetts's 43.0% is third-highest, and the reason is its flat 5% income tax applied with almost nothing sheltered — a $4,400 personal exemption and no standard deduction at all.
6. 30% of gross, and 30% of what you actually get
The 30% rule is HUD's cost-burden threshold under 24 CFR 5.603, and HUD applies it to gross income because that is what a housing programme can verify.
| Annual salary | 30% of gross | 30% of Massachusetts take-home | The gap |
|---|---|---|---|
| $45,000 | $1,125 | $908 | $217 |
| $60,000 | $1,500 | $1,190 | $310 |
| $85,000 | $2,125 | $1,615 | $510 |
At $85,000 the conventional rule allows $2,125 and the honest budget figure is $1,615. Massachusetts's income tax alone takes $4,030 of that salary — $336 a month.
What the two-bedroom costs at real salaries
| Annual salary | Statewide | Middlesex | Worcester |
|---|---|---|---|
| $45,000 | 68.3% | 97.2% | 68.0% |
| $60,000 | 52.1% | 74.1% | 51.8% |
| $85,000 | 38.4% | 54.6% | 38.2% |
Rent as a share of take-home pay.
At $85,000 — well above the national median — the statewide two-bedroom is 38.4% of take-home and Middlesex County's is 54.6%. HUD calls above 30% cost-burdened and above 50% severely cost-burdened.
At $45,000 the Middlesex figure is 97.2%, which is a way of saying the unit is not rentable on that income. A landlord's screen would refuse the application at $105,876 required against $45,000 offered.
7. Two counties, and what they show
| County | Studio | 2 bedroom | 3 bedroom | Basis |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Middlesex County | $2,359 | $2,941 | $3,526 | Median across the county's towns |
| Worcester County | $1,588 | $2,056 | $2,548 | Median across the county's towns |
Middlesex is $885 a month above Worcester on a two-bedroom — $10,620 a year, and a 43% premium.
Both are aggregates across town-level HUD areas, per section 2, and the within-county variation behind each is substantial.
Worcester County sits almost exactly on the statewide median at $2,056 against $2,067, which makes it a reasonable proxy for "typical Massachusetts outside the Boston orbit." Middlesex is what the Boston commuter belt costs.
Income required at 3x: $105,876 for Middlesex, $74,016 for Worcester. A $31,860 difference in the income a landlord will demand, for the same size of unit, in the same state.
8. Rent versus buy in Massachusetts
Three things decide it, and the rent is not one of them:
Appreciation. Buying overtakes renting mainly through appreciation, which varies by county and is backward-looking. This site's calculator uses FHFA House Price Index measurements rather than forecasts, and in some US counties buying never overtakes renting within thirty years.
Selling costs. Around 7% of the sale price in agent commission and transfer tax, and it never comes back.
How long you stay. The break-even is measured in years, not months.
Massachusetts adds one feature worth naming: Proposition 2½. It limits how fast a municipality's total property tax levy may grow — 2.5% a year plus new growth, with overrides requiring a local vote. That is a genuine constraint on the ongoing cost of ownership, and it is more favourable to a long-term owner than to a new buyer, since it caps the levy rather than your individual assessment.
And the rent side is unusually high, which shortens the break-even relative to a low-rent state: the annual cost of the alternative is large. Massachusetts is one of the states where the buy case is strongest on the arithmetic alone — subject to being able to assemble a deposit at Massachusetts prices, which is the binding constraint for most renters here.
Run the Massachusetts rent-versus-buy calculator with your own numbers.
9. What you can actually control
Find out which TOWN's rent area you are in. In Massachusetts the town is the operative unit, not the county, and there are 351 of them. A county figure — including the ones on this page — is an aggregate.
Get the landlord test and the budget test straight. 3x gross gets you approved. 30% of take-home is what you can carry. On the statewide $2,067 those are $74,412 of income and, at that income, $1,442 of rent — $625 less than the rent itself.
Existing debt does not appear in the landlord's test. A 3x screen does not subtract your car payment or student loan.
Ask specifically about heat. The FMR is a gross-rent figure and Massachusetts winters are expensive. A heat-included rent is closer to the FMR concept than one where you pay it, and the winter difference on an older building can be several hundred dollars a month.
Weigh the commuter rail properly. The rent gap between Middlesex and Worcester counties is $885 a month. An annual commuter rail pass costs a fraction of that, which is the arithmetic behind a great deal of Massachusetts housing behaviour — and the time cost is the part the money comparison misses.
And reduce the tax side. Massachusetts's flat 5% takes $4,030 from an $85,000 salary with almost nothing sheltered. A pre-tax 401(k) deferral saves 5% of whatever you defer at every income — $336 a month of the current bill, and the one lever entirely within your control.
10. How HUD's cost-burden thresholds actually work
The 30% and 50% figures quoted throughout this article are not rules of thumb. They are regulatory definitions, and knowing where they come from tells you what they are and are not good for.
HUD defines a household as "cost-burdened" when it spends more than 30% of gross income on housing, and "severely cost-burdened" above 50%. The threshold traces back to the National Housing Act, and HUD uses it to measure housing need and to set programme eligibility.
Three things follow from that origin, and all three matter to a renter:
It is measured against gross income because a housing programme can verify gross income. A caseworker can read a W-2. They cannot easily verify what your actual tax withholding, retirement deferrals and health premiums leave you. Gross is administratively tractable, not economically correct.
It counts housing costs, not just rent. HUD's measure includes utilities, which is precisely why the fair market rent is defined as gross rent. If you are comparing your own situation against the 30% threshold, include your utility bills — otherwise you are measuring a smaller number against the same line.
It is a population statistic before it is personal advice. The threshold exists to answer "how many households in this county are struggling," and it does that job well. It was never designed to tell one household what it can afford, and it does not account for household size, debt, childcare, medical costs, or the tax rate where you live.
Which is why this article reports both figures. In Massachusetts a two-bedroom at $2,067 against a $74,412 income is exactly at HUD's 30% line by HUD's own measure. Against what actually reaches that household's account it is closer to 40%. Both numbers are correct; they answer different questions.
If you want one number to plan around, use 30% of take-home. It is the more conservative of the two, it is the one that reflects what you can actually spend, and it is what this site's calculator reports alongside the conventional figure.
11. What a landlord checks besides your income
The 3x income screen is the most visible test, and it is not the only one. None of the following is a legal requirement — they are common industry practice, and individual landlords differ.
Credit score. Most professionally managed buildings run a credit check, and many publish a minimum. A low score does not automatically disqualify you, but it commonly triggers a larger deposit or a guarantor requirement.
Rental history and references. Previous landlords, length of tenancy, and any eviction filings. An eviction filing can appear on a tenant screening report even where the case was dismissed, which is worth knowing if you have one.
The security deposit. How much a landlord may ask for, when it must be returned, and what may be deducted are all governed by state law, and those rules vary enormously. Check Massachusetts's own statute — this site's rent dataset covers HUD fair market rents and does not cover landlord-tenant law, so nothing on this page should be read as describing it.
Application fees. Charged per applicant in most markets, and often non-refundable. Applying to several places at once is a real cost.
Guarantors and co-signers. Where an applicant fails the income screen, many landlords will accept a guarantor — commonly at a higher multiple, such as 80x the monthly rent in annual income rather than 36x. That is a much larger number than the tenant's own test, and it is the usual route for students and recent graduates.
Proof of income. Pay stubs, an offer letter, or tax returns for the self-employed. Self-employed applicants are frequently asked for two years of returns, which is a materially higher bar than a salaried applicant faces on the same income.
The practical point: the 3x screen decides whether you clear the first filter. Everything above decides whether you get the apartment, and several of those items cost money to fail.
12. When these figures change
HUD publishes fair market rents annually, effective at the start of the federal fiscal year on 1 October. The figures in this article are FY2026.
Three ways your area's number can move:
Re-measurement. HUD builds FMRs from American Community Survey data with more recent trend adjustments. A rent area whose measured market has moved will see its figure move with it.
Redefinition. HUD occasionally redraws rent areas — splitting a metro, adding a county to one, or creating a small-area FMR where ZIP-level figures replace a single metro figure. When that happens, a county's published rent can change substantially without any change in its actual market. Massachusetts has 20 rent areas today; that count is not fixed.
The $973 cluster. Seventeen states have their cheapest rent area at exactly $973 for a two-bedroom — the same dollar figure in seventeen separate states, which is a minimum HUD applies to some class of areas rather than seventeen markets coincidentally agreeing. It is not a universal floor: twenty states have rent areas below it, running down to $776 in Alabama. This site has not confirmed the mechanism against HUD's methodology and does not guess at it. What matters practically is that an area sitting at $973 is carrying an administered figure rather than a measured one, and it moves when that administered figure moves.
What that means for planning. A fair market rent is a well-sourced annual snapshot, not a forecast. If you are signing a twelve-month lease, the figure that matters is the rent in the lease, and the FMR is context for judging whether that rent is reasonable for the area and the unit size.
Voucher holders should note one thing more. FMRs set the basis for Housing Choice Voucher payment standards, and a public housing agency may set its standard within a range around the FMR rather than exactly at it. Your agency's payment standard is the operative number, not the published FMR.
Frequently asked questions
What is the average rent in Massachusetts? HUD's statewide fair market rent for a two-bedroom is $2,067 a month for FY2026, second-highest of the fifty states behind Hawaii. That is the 40th percentile of gross rent including tenant-paid utilities, so roughly 60% of units cost more.
Why does HUD not publish a rent for Massachusetts counties? Because it defines Massachusetts rent areas by town rather than by county, as it does across all six New England states. County figures — including the ones here — are aggregations across towns.
What income do I need to rent a two-bedroom in Massachusetts? A 3x landlord screen needs $74,412 on the statewide figure, $105,876 in Middlesex County and $74,016 in Worcester County.
Is 30% of income a realistic rent budget in Massachusetts? 30% of gross on $85,000 is $2,125. 30% of Massachusetts take-home on that salary is $1,615. The statewide two-bedroom at $2,067 sits between them, which is why so many Massachusetts renters are cost-burdened by HUD's measure.
Why does the 3x rule put me at 43% of take-home? Because 3x is measured against gross income and rent is paid out of net. Massachusetts's 43.0% is third-highest in the country, driven by a flat 5% income tax applied behind only a $4,400 exemption and no standard deduction.
Is there anywhere cheap in Massachusetts? Not by national standards. The cheapest rent area is $1,527 for a two-bedroom — higher than the statewide median in 44 states — and Massachusetts has no area at $973, the administered minimum that is the cheapest area in seventeen other states.
How much cheaper is Worcester than the Boston area? Worcester County's two-bedroom aggregate is $2,056 against Middlesex County's $2,941 — $885 a month, or $10,620 a year.
Should I buy in Massachusetts instead? The high rent shortens the break-even, and Proposition 2½ constrains the growth of the municipal levy. The binding constraint for most Massachusetts renters is assembling a deposit at Massachusetts prices. Run the rent-versus-buy calculator.
What to do next
Massachusetts rent is the second-highest in the country and its data is measured by town. Both facts change how you should read any county-level figure, including the ones here.
- Massachusetts rent affordability calculator — the landlord's test and the budget test, side by side.
- Massachusetts rent vs buy — the break-even year, computed rather than assumed.
- Massachusetts take-home pay — what actually reaches your account.
- The 30% rule is measured against the wrong number — the full argument.
- Renting in the USA in 2026 — all fifty states, county by county.
Every figure on this site is sourced and dated. How we source every number.
Rent figures are HUD Fair Market Rents for FY2026, from HUD User, published under 24 CFR 888.113. An FMR is the 40th percentile of gross rent including tenant-paid utilities for standard-quality units in a defined rent area — not a market median, and not comparable to an advertised rent excluding utilities. HUD defines Massachusetts rent areas by TOWN rather than by county, so the county figures here are this site's medians across each county's towns and are flagged as aggregates rather than presented as HUD publications. Statewide figures are the median across Massachusetts's 20 distinct rent areas, unweighted by population. Take-home figures are computed by this site's own tax engine for tax year 2026 on a single filer with no dependents or pre-tax deferrals, using federal figures from IRS Revenue Procedure 2025-32 and Massachusetts rates from this site's sourced 50-state dataset. The 3x landlord screen is a common industry practice, not a legal standard. Massachusetts landlord-tenant law and Proposition 2½'s detailed operation are outside this dataset. This is general education and not housing, legal or financial advice.