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Dallas-Fort Worth hauls in top spot among U.S. places for self-storage space
North Texans apparently love to store their stuff. More new self-storage space popped up last year in Dallas-Fort Worth than in all but two other U.S. metro areas.
In 2019, Dallas-Fort Worth gained 2.14 million square feet of new storage, according to an analysis by StorageCafé, a self-storage marketplace. As measured by square footage added, DFW ranked third last year, behind New York City (3.01 million square feet) and Phoenix (2.33 million square feet).
To put DFW’s 2019 influx of self-storage space into context, AT&T Stadium encompasses 3 million square feet.
If that weren’t stunning enough, consider this: Dallas-Fort Worth has more self-storage space than any other area in the country, at over 62.7 million square feet, StorageCafé says.
The only other Texas metro area in the top 10 last year was Houston, ranking ninth with the addition of 1.53 million square feet of self-storage, according to StorageCafé. That’s less than 400,000 square feet shy of the size of NRG Stadium. The Houston area has now passed the 1,000-facility mark, StorageCafé says.
Among the country’s 10 most active development markets, Houston offers the self-storage square footage per capita (10.5), StorageCafé says. That works out to more than one standard storage unit for every 10 people. By comparison, the New York City metro area has 3.1 square feet per capita.
Not surprisingly, more self-storage space is on the way in DFW and Houston to accommodate population growth.
More than 1.4 million square feet of space is set to open this year in DFW, according to StorageCafé, with over 2 million square feet in the pipeline. A report from data provider Yardi Matrix shows under-construction and planned space in DFW represented 7.3 percent of existing supply in January, compared with the 9.1 percent national average.
StorageCafé and Yardi Matrix are part of real estate software company Yardi Systems.
As a testament to storage demand in DFW, a startup called Neighbor.com announced March 5 that it had launched its peer-to-peer storage marketplace in North Texas. The Lehi, Utah-based platform enables residents to rent out home storage space to their neighbors. Neighborhood.com estimates Texans spend $5 billion a year on storage.
The Houston area’s self-storage supply is projected to expand by 1.2 million square feet this year, according to StorageCafé, with over 1.7 million square feet in the pipeline. In January, under-construction and planned facilities in Houston accounted for 3.3 percent of current supply, Yardi Matrix says.
