The most expensive apartment at Alexan Peabody rents for $4,300 a month. That’s the C1 three bedroom, priced on the building’s own website on September 2, 2026, and it comes to $51,600 a year. In June, the median single family home listed in Peabody asked $667,000. Those two numbers belong in the same conversation, and the building’s marketing will never put them there.
The rest of the rent card, per alexanpeabody.com the same day, runs studios from $2,403, one bedrooms from $2,560 to $2,740, and two bedrooms from $3,349 to $3,680, with several floor plans showing no price at all. The building opened in March 2025, which makes this a lease up, and lease ups come with banners. We’ll get to the banner.
Two Months Free, Six Offers, and a September Deadline
The banner on alexanpeabody.com read, as of September 2, 2026, “Receive 2 Months Free When You Move In by 9/30. Only 6 Offers Available.” Earlier listings around the web carried a month free, then six weeks free on two bedrooms. Some version of free rent has been running for most of the building’s first eighteen months. That’s not a scandal. It’s what filling 180 new apartments looks like. But an offer with a countdown printed on it is designed to make you decide fast, and a decision about $40,000 a year of housing deserves a slow read.
Run the current offer through one apartment. The B4 two bedroom listed at $3,680 on September 2. Two months free is worth $7,360, which brings the first year to about $3,067 a month. At renewal the free months are gone and the sticker is back, a jump of roughly $613 a month, around 20 percent, written into the deal before you’ve unpacked. On the C1 three bedroom at $4,300, the same offer is worth $8,600 in year one, and the same cliff waits in year two.
What to do with that. Ask the leasing office for two numbers in writing before you apply: the price of this unit on a straight twelve month lease with no concession and every mandatory monthly fee included, and the rent this unit goes to once the concession ends. We couldn’t find a published fee schedule anywhere on September 2, so the leasing desk is the only place the real total exists.
On Route 1, Everyone Drives
Alexan Peabody’s address is 128 Newbury Street, which is Route 1 itself, down near the Lynnfield line. The building’s own marketing embraces the highway and points to Market Street Lynnfield, a short drive south. Walk Score rates the address 49, car dependent, and Peabody has no commuter rail station anywhere in the city, so a train to Boston starts with a drive to Salem, Lynn, or Wakefield. All of that shapes what the rent is buying.
In a downtown building, part of the premium pays for walking to dinner and the train. On Route 1, the premium buys the pool deck, the fitness center, and new construction, while the driving life stays the same as it would be in a house with a yard a few miles away. When the car is a given either way, the comparison narrows to space, payment, and what the payment leaves behind.
What to do with that. Before you sign or renew, drive your real commute from the building’s lot at your real hour, then drive the same commute from a neighborhood you could buy in. If both start with the same twenty minutes on Route 1 or 95, then location has dropped out of the deal, and the rent is paying for the lobby.
A Three Bedroom Rent Next to a House Payment
Families are the renters this building can hold that most North Shore buildings can’t. Three bedroom apartments are scarce in new construction around here, and Alexan’s ran $4,105 to $4,300 on the operator’s September pricing. Peabody’s median single family listing asked $667,000 in June 2026, and sale prices this past year ran near $700,000. Nobody needs a calculator to feel the size of $4,300 a month. The question is what that money could be doing instead.
An owner’s biggest line item, the principal and interest on a fixed rate loan, is the same in year ten as in year one, and part of every payment comes back as equity. A renter’s payment moves the other way. It starts discounted and climbs. Two bedroom renters have a parallel path on the condo side, where Peabody’s market is thin, seven active listings when we checked in early September, with a listing median around $466,000 and the low end near $248,000. Thin inventory is real, and so is the distance between a $3,680 rent and what those listing prices carry monthly.
What to do with that. Bring a broker three numbers, your effective rent this year, your rent after the concession ends, and your savings, and ask for the ownership side as one complete monthly payment with taxes, insurance, and any condo fee inside it. Peabody’s property tax rates run lower than several neighboring North Shore towns, a detail that moves the monthly answer more than most renters expect.
The Hottest ZIP Code in America Had Twelve Houses for Sale
Realtor.com named Peabody’s ZIP code the hottest in the country for 2026. Homes here sold in about 20 days and slightly above asking this summer, and back in February the whole city had twelve single family homes on the market. Meanwhile the rental side added 180 brand new apartments at Alexan alone, with smaller mixed income projects behind it. New supply keeps arriving on the renting side of the line. The owning side stays close to fixed.
A market that hot cuts both ways, and pretending otherwise would be sales talk. Buying in Peabody takes preparation, a real budget, and the patience to lose a bid or two. That argues for starting the financing homework early, while you’re still comfortable in your lease, so that when the right listing hits the market you’re the prepared bidder. It argues even harder against waiting for prices to soften while renewal letters climb in the background.
Where We Come In
GoldCoast Mortgage Service is an independent mortgage broker in Beverly, one town over. John Donlon, who owns it, has spent more than 25 years financing homes on the North Shore, plenty of them for renters who started with nothing but a rent card and a hunch. A bank can offer you its own loans. A broker shops your file across many lenders, and in a market where houses go in 20 days, the quality of your financing preparation is part of your offer.
We’ll pre-qualify you at no cost, so you know your budget before you spend a Saturday at open houses. And if your best deal this year turns out to be the two free months, we’ll say so, and we’ll tell you how to use the year.
Recommended Realtors for First-Time Buyers
We work regularly with two local agents who are good with first-time buyers and who won’t rush you:
- Arthur Martiroso, DNA Realty Group, 617-921-5015
- Joshua Riopelle, Simes City Realty, North Andover, 978-590-2741
You’re welcome to work with any agent you like. We mention them because renters often ask us who to call once the financing side makes sense.
Questions From Renters at Alexan Peabody
With two months free, isn’t renting the cheaper move this year?
This year, probably. The comparison that decides things is year two, when the concession is gone and the rent steps back to the sticker. If renting only wins while the discount lasts, what you’ve found is a cheap year, and years end.
Can I use the free months to get ready to buy?
That’s the smartest use of this offer. If the concession is saving you around $600 a month against the sticker, move that amount into savings on the first of every month, as if it were rent. On the B4 example that’s $7,360 over the year, most of a 3.5 percent FHA down payment on the lower priced condos listed in Peabody this September, and a serious start on one at the median.
Everyone says Peabody is the hottest market in America. Shouldn’t I wait for it to cool?
Waiting for a hot market to cool is a strategy with a cost attached. While you wait, the rent steps up at renewal, and the twelve houses for sale don’t multiply because renters got patient. If prices flatten, your preparation still pays. If they don’t, waiting was the expensive choice. Either way, knowing your number costs nothing.
What about the affordable apartments at Alexan Peabody?
Forty five of the building’s 180 homes are income restricted at 80 percent of area median income, with the same finishes as the market rate units, and they run through a housing lottery instead of the leasing office’s pricing. If your income fits the program, it can be a strong deal with its own application path and rules. SEB Housing administers it, so check there for current availability.
How much do I need for a down payment?
Less than the folklore says. The median first time buyer puts down about 10 percent, FHA allows 3.5 percent down with a 580 credit score, and the Massachusetts ONE Mortgage program starts near 3 percent with no private mortgage insurance. Bank a concession year and several of those come within reach.