As higher interest rates and mortgage rates have slowed home buying, that’s helped send Manhattan’s median apartment rent to a record high for the month of January and keep it at the third-highest level overall of any month.

The median rental price in January rose 15.4% to $4,097 in January from a year earlier and up 1.2% from December, according to a report released Thursday by brokerage firm Douglas Elliman compiled by appraisal firm Miller Samuel.

The number of new leases rose year over year for the first time in three months. The vacancy rate dropped to 2.52% from 2.69% in December, the first monthly decline in nine months even though it ticked up from 1.7% a year earlier.

In a sign of continued high-end demand, luxury median rent remained at the third-highest level on record. Luxury bidding wars that led renters to pay more than what was asked for accounted for nearly one in five rentals, according to the report.

Average rent in Manhattan rose 12.5% to $5,142 in January.

“The vacancy rate and record rents show the market is not becoming more affordable,” Jonathan Miller, president and chief executive of Miller Samuel, told CoStar News in an email. “High interest rates push people into the rental market, plus employment is robust.”

The same dynamics also apply to other boroughs, Miller told CoStar.

In Brooklyn, for instance, average rent and average rent per square foot in January rose to a new high as the median rent was the second highest in history, according to the study.

Average rent in Brooklyn jumped nearly 32% to $4,165 in January from a year earlier. Median rent rose 25% to nearly $3,500.

Meanwhile, in Northwest Queens, which includes the popular neighborhoods of Astoria and Long Island City, net effective average and median rents both rose to the highest levels on record. The average rental price rose 13.5% to $3,577.

As mortgage rates have risen, newly signed co-op sale contracts declined nearly 49% in January from a year earlier while newly signed condo contracts slumped 51%, according to a separate report from Douglas Elliman and Miller Samuel.

Other data also suggests rental prices in the city show little sign of easing. Market asking rent per unit in New York surged to a record high of $2,981 in the first quarter, CoStar data shows.

New York’s rental market not becoming more affordable has played a part in people moving out to other states, led by Florida. New York state trailed just California in net domestic out-migration, with 299,557 in New York moving out last year, according to a report from the National Association of Realtors citing U.S. Census data.

However, having more people move in also has pushed up housing prices in states such as Florida. In Miami, for instance, annual rent growth hit record highs at the end of March at 18.4%. While growth has slowed to 6.3%, that's still above historical levels.