A new study predicts that growing employment in Miami will benefit the market for apartments.

A report released Tuesday by the Marcus & Millichap real estate firm predicts that the apartment sector in Miami Dade-County — riding a wave of growing employment — is expected to improve respectably, with vacancies declining and rental rates increasing.

The study predicts that vacancy rates will fall from 5.7 percent to a post-recession low of 4.7 percent, while the average rental rates will increase 3 percent. Those statistics are based on similarly positive employment predictions, which see employment in Miami-Dade County expanding 1.8 percent in 2011 with the addition of 18,000 jobs. So as employment increases, so will investment in rentals.

Although data was not available for Class A rentals, Class B and C rentals, which are defined as older, institutional properties in modern markets such as Hialeah and Coral Gables, will continue their recovery as hiring rebounds. Vacancy in those areas, the report predicts, will fall to 3 percent this year, after rising to more than 5 percent at the peak of the recession.

For the rest of 2011, the study estimates that a lack of affordable housing alternatives for working-class residents will generate even stronger rent demand.

This study on apartments follows two equally welcome Miami Agent reports from the last two weeks that condominium sales and prices in Miami are recovering. Condo interest is back; and so to, it would seem, are apartment rentals.