With home prices high and interest rates stubbornly elevated, renters are staying longer and longer in place, according to an analysis last month by Point2Homes, a real estate listing portal for rental homes in the U.S.  

Renters who have lived in their homes five to nine years increased 2% from 16% in 2017 to 18% in 2022, according to the analysis. People who have stayed 10-plus years in their rental homes increased 2.6% from 16.1% to 18.7%.

Meanwhile, the number of people who move in less than a year declined by 4.5%, from 26.7% in 2017 to 22.2% to 2022. The analysis is of recently released U.S. Census Bureau data of 75 of the largest metros in the U.S.

“More and more house renters are slowly but surely making the single-family home rental they currently occupy into what may be their forever home,” wrote Andra Hopulele, in a blog post on her company’s website.

The shares of renters who move after less than a year dropped the most in Bakersfield, California (-12.4%); followed by Tucson, Arizona (-10%); and Omaha-Council Bluffs, Nebraska-Iowa (-10%), according to Point2Homes.

The leading metro areas where people stay longer in their homes are in California, according to the survey. Both Riverside-San Bernadino-Ontario and Oxnard-Thousand Oaks-Ventura saw the share of people staying five-plus years or more grow by more than 7% between 2017 and 2022.

Millennials transitioned from renter-majority to owner-majority in 2022, according to the New York Times. But just barely. Only 51.5% of millennials own their home, leaving nearly half of the largest generation in the U.S. as renters.

People who rent a house clearly prefer three-bedroom homes, according the Point2Homes analysis. Of house renters, 47% are living in three-bedroom homes compared to just 10% living in a single-bedroom house.