Standing outside the office of Plus Property Management, clutching a stack of apartment applications, Malcolm Heald looked a little defeated.

The Central Oregon Community College student’s landlord raised the monthly rent on his west Bend duplex by $30 earlier this year.

Since July, Heald has been scouring local rental listings and Craigs-list ads looking for something — anything — in Bend for $550 or less.

“I thought I’d be able to find something easy, but I guess that was pretty naive,” Heald said.

Rental prices have increased across the city over the last year, as the supply of available properties has dropped alarmingly low.

Data from New York-based real estate research firm Reis highlight the price uptick playing out across Bend, Deschutes County and the state.

An average Deschutes County apartment cost $704 a month to rent in the second quarter of the year, according to Reis data. That’s up from $690 in the third quarter of 2012, or a roughly 2 percent increase.

Meanwhile, the vacancy rate — the percentage of all apartment units available — dropped from 3.7 percent to 3.2 percent over that time.

Those changes may not seem earth-shattering. But the trend is putting pressure on local rental companies to raise prices while waiting for new inventory, several property management officials said.

The survey only covers apartment buildings, so it doesn’t take into account rental homes and other properties.

Earlier this year, the Central Oregon Rental Owners Association said the region’s rental vacancy rate was just 1 percent, after surveying more than 4,500 properties of all types across Deschutes County.

That’s down from a 4.4 percent vacancy rate in 2012, according to rental association figures. Rent on an average one-bedroom apartment in Bend rose from $549 in 2012 to $571 in 2013, while two-bedroom rental rates rose from $629 to $704.

“The market is still very tight,” said Michelle Bunting, president of Bend Property Management Co. “There’s definitely more people looking than there are places to rent.”

Oregon’s other metro areas seem to be grappling with the same problem. Just 2.3 percent of Eugene metro-area apartments were vacant in the second quarter, and 2.9 percent of Portland-area apartments were available, Reis data show. The Salem and Medford areas had 2.4 percent and 2.5 percent vacancy rates, respectively.

Like Bend, the other metro areas have seen their average rental rates increase slightly over the last year.

Several major apartment projects in east Bend could add 489 new apartment units, easing the city’s vacancy crunch. But only one is currently under construction.

In April, construction crews started work on the 104-unit Sage Springs apartment complex, off of Boyd Acres Road and north of Butler Market Road.

It’s expected to be completed in February, with each unit containing two bedrooms and two bathrooms.

Two other proposals came to light in August, though developers haven’t returned calls seeking comment on them.

Bend resident Craig Studwell met with Bend Community Development Department staff on Aug. 22 to discuss his proposal for a 144-unit complex made up of 15 buildings in the southeast part of town between Pettigrew Road and Daly Estates Road.

A week later, Vancouver, Wash.-based Hoviss Development Group met with the city to discuss its plan for four large apartment buildings with a total of 241 units. The group is targeting the site of a former mobile home park on Alstrup Road, which was cleared away in the hope of building a subdivision before the previous owner lost the land to foreclosure when the market crashed.

Both apartment projects would include one-, two- and three-bedroom units, according to blueprints the developers submitted to the city last month.

If they’re built, the projects would be welcome additions, Bunting said, though they’re likely still a ways off.

“When you look back over time in Bend, whenever the rental market gets snug, so to speak, people build more, and it loosens back up,” she said. “That’s the name of the game, how builders know it’s time to build. It’s definitely time.”