Nowflation’s shelter gauge reads 1.97% year over year as of October 23, 2026 (0.000pp on the day, 0.000pp on the week, −0.030pp on the month; level 148.158, January 2018 = 100). The official BLS CPI shelter was 3.2% for September 2026, released October 14, 2026 — a gap of −1.23pp today, −1.17pp like for like (the gauge’s September 2026 average against that print). The category carries 34.0% of the CPI basket; 100% of that weight is priced from live sources today. Next print: October 2026 CPI on November 10, 2026 at 8:30 AM ET. A measurement, not a forecast. Why official rent lags market rents: rent inflation, explained.
| Component | Basket weight | YoY | Contribution to the category | Feed today |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Shelter: Owned | 26.2% | 1.97% | +1.52pp | LIVE — rides the all-tenant rent index (rent weight + owners’-equivalent weight, as in the Gauge) |
| Shelter: Rent | 7.8% | 1.97% | +0.46pp | LIVE — zori_us + aptlist_rent_us (all_tenant model) |
Nowflation’s shelter gauge reads 1.97% year over year as of October 23, 2026, measured daily on the CPI basket weights (34.0% of the basket). The official BLS CPI shelter was 3.2% for September 2026, released October 14, 2026.
Today’s reading is −1.23pp versus the last print. All of the category weight is priced from live sources today. Like for like — the gauge’s average over September 2026 against that print — the gap was −1.17pp.
The October 2026 CPI prints on November 10, 2026 at 8:30 AM ET; this page steps to it the same morning.
The BLS December chain over the member components (index Jan 2018 = 100), the aggregation the headline Gauge uses under method v1.5: each year’s relative-importance weights multiply price relatives since the previous December, and the year-over-year change joins the year-ago-to-December segment to the December-to-today one. A component priced on a monthly source compares that source’s latest month with the same month a year earlier, and takes the official subindex while BLS has published a newer month. The whole history on this page is computed under this method. Each contribution is the component’s exact share of the category’s year-over-year change; they add up to the reading. In the Gauge both the rent weight and the owners’-equivalent weight ride the all-tenant rent index: new-lease rents (Zillow ZORI and Apartment List, chain-linked) averaged over the tenure of every lease in force — what the renting population pays this month, measured, not forecast. The official shelter subindex reprices each surveyed unit every six months, which is the lag the gap on this page reflects.
The BLS December chain over the member components (index Jan 2018 = 100), the aggregation the headline Gauge uses under method v1.5: each year’s relative-importance weights multiply price relatives since the previous December, and the year-over-year change joins the year-ago-to-December segment to the December-to-today one. A component priced on a monthly source compares that source’s latest month with the same month a year earlier, and takes the official subindex while BLS has published a newer month. The whole history on this page is computed under this method. Each contribution is the component’s exact share of the category’s year-over-year change; they add up to the reading. In the Gauge both the rent weight and the owners’-equivalent weight ride the all-tenant rent index: new-lease rents (Zillow ZORI and Apartment List, chain-linked) averaged over the tenure of every lease in force — what the renting population pays this month, measured, not forecast. The official shelter subindex reprices each surveyed unit every six months, which is the lag the gap on this page reflects. The official subindex is quoted at the last print (NSA, one decimal). The daily reading is a measurement of today; the like-for-like comparison is the calendar-month average of the daily series for the print’s reference month (at_print_month_pct), which is what the gap-at-print figure uses. Components: shelter_rent, shelter_owned; weights from the BLS CPI-U relative-importance table (engine weights.json) (2026). Engine construction v1.5.
Embed: <iframe src="https://nowflation.com/embed?view=category&c=shelter"> (builder).
Zillow data: Data Provided by Zillow Group.