Anchorage multifamily underwriting.
Most underwriting guides are written for the Lower 48. They assume heat is a rounding error, taxes move predictably, and the hard part is finding the deal. None of that survives contact with an Anchorage rent roll.
This is the process we use on our own buildings. Every number below traces to a source you can open yourself, and they are all listed at the bottom.
Nobody is required to check the numbers for you
Alaska law is unusually direct about this. Under AS 08.88.630, a real estate licensee does not owe you a duty to conduct an independent inspection of the property, to investigate anyone's financial condition, or to independently verify the accuracy of a statement made by a party to the transaction. Unless you agree otherwise in writing, that is the default on both sides of the table.
We are a brokerage and we are telling you this anyway, because we also own and operate 87 units here. The seller's spreadsheet is a marketing document. Treat it as a set of claims to test, and the rest of this page as the test.
One more thing worth saying plainly. Anchorage is a small market. The same buildings trade repeatedly, the same names recur on the deeds, and the operating history of a property is usually knowable if you ask the right people. That is an advantage a national spreadsheet cannot give you.
Anchorage rent and vacancy
The Alaska Department of Labor surveys the Anchorage rental market every spring. The 2025 survey covered 8,423 units in the Municipality and is the most recent published set as of August 2026. These are contract rents, so they are what tenants actually pay, not asking rents.
| Apartment type | Average rent | Vacancy |
|---|---|---|
| Studio | $1,068 | 8.2% |
| 1 bedroom | $1,322 | 5.5% |
| 2 bedroom | $1,527 | 5.7% |
| 3 bedroom | $1,807 | 5.1% |
| All units | $1,474 | 5.6% |
The trend matters more than the year
Rent and vacancy have risen together for four straight years. That is the part a seller's summary tends to leave out, and it is the part that decides whether your vacancy assumption is conservative or wishful.
| Survey year | Average rent | Vacancy |
|---|---|---|
| 2021 | $1,111 | 4.3% |
| 2022 | $1,262 | 3.2% |
| 2023 | $1,338 | 4.1% |
| 2024 | $1,421 | 4.6% |
| 2025 | $1,474 | 5.6% |
Municipality of Anchorage, all surveyed unit types. Source: Alaska Department of Labor and Workforce Development rental market survey.
The fifth unit changes what you are
In the Municipality's 2026 valuation report, 2 to 3 unit and 4 unit multifamily sit in the residential bucket. Apartments of five or more units sit in the commercial bucket, alongside office, retail and industrial. That line is worth understanding before you buy the fifth door.
The practical difference shows up in exemptions. In 2026 Anchorage residential property carried about $37.2 billion in total value against $30.3 billion taxable, because exemptions sit between the two. Commercial carried $11.1 billion in value and $11.1 billion taxable. There is no cushion on the commercial side.
2026 assessment changes, excluding new construction
| Property type | Average change | Assessed as |
|---|---|---|
| Four plex | +11.6% | Residential |
| Apartments, 5+ units | +7.1% | Commercial |
| Duplex / triplex | +5.6% | Residential |
| Condos | +5.8% | Residential |
| Single family | +3.5% | Residential |
Four plexes moved hardest at 11.6 percent. If that is the size you are shopping, your tax line is the assumption most likely to be stale, and the seller's number is the one least likely to survive your purchase.
2026 mill rates, straight from the ordinance
The Assembly set 2026 rates in AO 2026-43 on April 14, 2026. These are the general government service areas an Anchorage Bowl property typically falls in. A mill is one dollar of tax per thousand dollars of assessed value.
| Service area | Mills |
|---|---|
| Anchorage Metropolitan Police, Fund 151 | 3.64 |
| Anchorage Fire Service Area, Fund 131 | 2.27 |
| Anchorage Roads & Drainage, Fund 141 | 2.24 |
| Anchorage Parks & Recreation, Fund 161 | 0.67 |
| Areawide General, Fund 101 | 0.36 |
| Areawide APD IT Systems, Fund 107 | 0.04 |
| Areawide EMS Lease, Fund 103 | 0.02 |
| Chugach State Park Access, Fund 110 | 0.01 |
| Sum of the above | 9.25 |
Read this carefully. That 9.25 is general government only. The areawide school levy is set separately and is not in AO 2026-43, so your actual bill is higher. Service area membership also varies by parcel, and Girdwood, Chugiak and the limited road service areas carry their own rates. Pull the tax district for the specific parcel rather than applying this total to a building you have not looked up.
New for 2026. The Municipality raised the business personal property exemption to $100,000. For an apartment building that means appliances, laundry equipment and office furnishings up to that value come off the personal property roll. The Municipality expects the change to reduce its tax base by roughly $370 million, under 1 percent.
Heat is the risk line
Most Anchorage multifamily burns Enstar natural gas, and Cook Inlet supply is tight in a way that is now on the public record. In July 2026 Enstar's president and CEO John Sims said the utility expects deliverability problems out of Cook Inlet for the next couple of years, and put the price gap in plain numbers: imported LNG runs around $22 per MCF against the $10.80 Enstar pays today.
If your building is master metered for heat, that gap is your problem, not your tenants'. If units are individually metered, it is still your problem, because it shows up as pressure on what the market will bear in rent. Either way, a single fixed heating number in a pro forma is not an underwrite. Model a range.
Water and sewer moved too. The Anchorage Assembly approved an across-the-board increase of about 5 percent for AWWU effective February 2026, taking a single family residential water and sewer bill from $123.15 to $128.61 a month. Multifamily rates differ from that residential example, but the direction is the same and it compounds annually.
$10.80
Per MCF, Cook Inlet gas today
What Enstar reports paying now, per its CEO in July 2026.
$22
Per MCF, imported LNG
Roughly double. This is the number to stress test against.
~5%
AWWU increase, Feb 2026
Across the board, approved by the Assembly in December 2025.
Seven steps, in order
Rebuild the rent roll from scratch
Ask for the actual leases, not the summary spreadsheet. You are looking for three things the summary hides: how many units are on month to month, how many are rented to someone related to the seller, and how many carry concessions that expire the month after closing. Then price every unit against the Alaska Department of Labor survey figures below. If the rent roll runs well above the survey average for that bedroom count, the burden is on the seller to show you why.
Set vacancy from the trend, not the snapshot
Anchorage vacancy has climbed four years running while rents also climbed. That combination usually means new supply and softening absorption rather than a broken market, but it is the opposite of the tightening story a seller will tell you. Underwrite the direction of travel. A 5 percent vacancy assumption in a market that just printed 5.6 percent and is trending up is not conservative, it is optimistic.
Reassess the taxes at your purchase price, not the seller’s basis
This is the single most common way an Anchorage multifamily pro forma breaks. The seller’s tax line reflects an assessment that may be years stale. A sale is a market signal, and the assessor uses it. Model your taxes on what the property will be assessed at after you buy it, then check whether crossing four units to five moves you into the commercial class.
Price heat as a risk, not a fixed cost
Most Anchorage multifamily runs on Enstar natural gas, and Cook Inlet supply is genuinely constrained. Enstar’s own CEO has put the gap on the record: about $10.80 per MCF today against roughly $22 for imported LNG. If your building is master metered for heat, that spread lands on your P&L, not the tenant’s. Underwrite a range and know which end of it breaks the deal.
Add the line items a Lower 48 template leaves out
Snow and ice removal is a real recurring contract, not a maintenance rounding error. So is boiler service on a building that runs one continuously for eight months. Freeze damage risk shapes your insurance and your reserve. If the expense list you were handed does not have a snow line on it, the seller either self performed it or left it off, and both change your number.
Set reserves against the actual building, not a percentage
A percentage of gross rent is a placeholder, not an underwrite. Age the roof, the boiler, the windows and the parking surface, then fund what those actually cost to replace on an Anchorage contractor schedule where most exterior work has to happen in a short summer window. A deferred roof here is not a next-year problem, it is a next-May problem.
Verify everything yourself, because nobody is required to
Under Alaska law a real estate licensee does not owe you a duty to inspect the property, investigate anyone’s financial condition, or independently verify the accuracy of what a party to the transaction tells them, unless you agree otherwise in writing. That is AS 08.88.630, and it applies to your broker and the seller’s. Read it as an instruction: the numbers are yours to prove.
Underwriting FAQ
Does buying a fifth unit change how my building is taxed in Anchorage?
It changes how it is classified. The Municipality’s 2026 valuation report groups 2 to 3 unit and 4 unit multifamily under residential, and apartments of 5 or more units under commercial. Anchorage residential property carried roughly $37.2 billion in total value against $30.3 billion taxable in 2026, a gap created by exemptions. Commercial carried $11.1 billion in total value and $11.1 billion taxable, with effectively no exemption cushion. Confirm your own parcel with the assessor rather than assuming, but understand that the fourth-to-fifth unit line is a real one here.
What vacancy rate should I underwrite for an Anchorage apartment building?
The 2025 Alaska Department of Labor survey put the Municipality of Anchorage at 5.6 percent across 8,423 surveyed units. That is up from 3.2 percent in 2022, so the four-year direction matters more than any single year. Studios ran hottest at 8.2 percent. If someone hands you a 3 percent vacancy assumption on an Anchorage deal in 2026, ask which year they pulled it from.
How much should I budget for heat on a master metered Anchorage building?
Budget a range and stress test the top of it. Enstar has said publicly that Cook Inlet deliverability will be a problem for the next couple of years, and the price gap between local gas and imported LNG is roughly two to one on the numbers their CEO gave in July 2026. We are not going to hand you a dollar-per-unit figure that pretends that uncertainty away. What we will do is model your specific building at several gas prices so you know where the deal stops working.
Are Anchorage property assessments actually moving in 2026?
Yes, and unevenly. Excluding new construction, the Municipality reported four plexes up 11.6 percent, apartments of five or more units up 7.1 percent, and duplex and triplex up 5.6 percent for 2026. Commercial property overall rose 7.7 percent against 4.3 percent for residential. Four plexes moved most, which is worth knowing if that is the size you are shopping.
Do I need a separate appraisal if the assessor already valued the property?
They answer different questions. An assessment is a mass-appraisal figure produced for tax purposes across thousands of parcels. Your lender wants a single-property opinion of value, and you want an underwrite. The Municipality publishes its own sale-ratio work, which for 2025 single-family disclosed sales came in at 95 percent of sale price, so assessments track the market reasonably well in aggregate. Aggregate accuracy is not the same as being right about your building.
Check our work
Every figure on this page comes from one of these. Alaska DOL publishes its rental survey each spring, so the 2025 survey is the current one as of August 2026. Assessment figures are the Municipality's 2026 report. If you find something here that has gone stale, tell us and we will fix it.
- · Alaska Department of Labor, rental costs and vacancy by unit type
- · Alaska Department of Labor, rental costs and vacancy, all units
- · Municipality of Anchorage, 2026 Property Appraisal Annual Valuation Report
- · Anchorage Assembly AO 2026-43, 2026 general government tax levy
- · Alaska Public Media, Enstar on Cook Inlet supply and heating bills, July 2026
- · Anchorage Daily News, AWWU 2026 water and sewer rate increase
- · Alaska Real Estate Commission consumer disclosure, form 08-4145
- · Alaska Statute 08.88.630, duties not owed by licensee