The Marcus & Millichap real estate firm published a pretty downbeat apartment rental forecast for our region. Apartment vacancy here is supposed to climb 1.3 percentage points to reached 9.7 percent in 2009.

Doesn't sound that high?  Our projected vacancy makes us 10th worst in the nation. Jacksonville sits atop the dishonor roll, and Sun Belt markets dominate the top 10.

Marcus & Millichap also compiled a National Apartment Index that rates where it makes sense for its real estate clients to invest in apartment buildings. Tampa ranked a dismal 41 out of 43. We fell 14 places from our 27th ranking last year.

The full report is here: Download marcusmilli09.pdf  Tampa's mentioned near the beginning and again on page 51.

The report predicted that Tampa would lose 28,000 jobs this year, making us the 7th worst market for employment. I'm actually somewhat encouraged by that number considering the firm Global Insight forecast 42,900 job losses in our region this year.