Shopping for a rental

Are you paying too much in rent? Could you get a better deal elsewhere? Rentometer.com may help you find out.

The site is simple: At the home page, just enter the address of an apartment or rental house, the current rent, the number of bedrooms and the number of units in the building. The site will tell you the median rent for that type of rental in that area.

Renters can use the site to assess the rent of current or prospective apartments, and landlords can quickly see whether they’re charging too little or too much.

A “Top 10” page shows the most expensive places to rent in the country (9 of the 10 most costly cities are in California).

Rentometer, launched in 2006, is run by Investment Instruments Corp. of Newton, Mass.

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-- Scott J. Wilson