It’s the same story from one real estate broker to another. Demand for city apartment rentals is red hot in a slowing housing market, a sharp contrast from three years ago when rentals went begging in New York City as the overwhelming preference was to buy, not to rent.

A senior vice president of Bellmarc Realty, Deanne Esses, sums it up. “Rentals are going like a bat out of hell,” she says. “Anything decent is grabbed up right away. Maybe some last a week or two, but that’s it.”

Describing rentals as the strongest they’ve been in five years, she expects them to remain hot, largely, she says, because apartment prices – despite a weaker housing market – are out of sight. They’re even too expensive, she notes, for people earning $150,000 to $175,000 a year. More and more, she adds, entry-level buyers simply cannot afford to ante up the funds needed to buy.

Despite all the bubble talk, rental prices remain high and restrictive in the city, Ms. Esses points out. This is especially the case, she says, with sales of condos, which, the broker notes, are enjoying sustained overseas demand, notably from the Chinese and Russians.

Further, the trend in new construction – which is almost entirely aimed at buyers, not renters – is also thought to be heightening rental demand. “Builders overwhelmingly are building to sell, not to rent,” Ms. Esses says.

The vigor of the rental market, she says, can be seen in surging rental prices, many which are up by 30% to 50% over a year ago.

For example, a year ago, a small one-bedroom apartment went for around $2,000 a month; now, if you can find one, that same type of apartment runs between $2,800 and $3,000. A studio, she notes, used to rent for between $1,200 and $1,500 a month; now, it costs between $1,800 and $2,500. And two-bedroom units have risen over the past year from about $3,500 to $4,500.

As a result, she notes that a lot of real estate brokers who moved to sales from rentals in recent years are shifting back to rentals.”They’re going where the action is,” she says.

The tell-tale clue, Ms. Esses says, is to ask yourself “when was the last time you passed an apartment house and saw a ‘for sale’ sign for an apartment? The answer is you don’t see them anymore because for now, they’ve gone the way of the rotary phone.”

Meanwhile, the inventory of apartments for sale – the lack of which was the main reason for the city’s real estate boom – is mushrooming, she tells me. “A year ago, maybe I had two or three apartments for sale; today, I can show you 20,” she says.

Ms. Esses attributes the rising inventory largely to the rejuvenation of the stock market, what with key averages hovering around multi-year highs. “Stocks are doing well again, and now, instead of rushing into real estate as they’ve done the past few years, people are rushing back into the market,” she says.

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WRONG AIRLINE STOCK: Kenneth McLane, a big loser in JetBlue Airways, e-mails me: “Dan, I loaded up on JetBlue a few years ago in the $30s and I’m down almost 70%. I notice many airline stocks are rebounding, but not JetBlue. My broker likes the stock and is pushing me to buy some more. Does that make sense to you?”

Sorry, but it makes no sense to Bob McAdoo, who tracks airlines for the Prudential Equity Group and thinks investors should dump JetBlue shares on any strength.

The low-cost carrier recently announced it would add service between JFK and both Pittsburgh and Jacksonville, Fla., as well as service from Boston to both Buffalo and Pittsburgh. While the analyst thinks these additions have positive short-term implications, he’s concerned that over the longer run JetBlue lacks sufficient gates to handle all the aircraft that are scheduled to be delivered through the balance of the year and into 2007. As such, he believes the airline’s shares will trade down over the rest of 2006 as it goes on operating its current fleet in numerous weaker long-haul New York City and Boston markets and finds it difficult to develop attractive markets away from New York.

The analyst expects JetBlue to lose $0.6 a share this year, $0.26 next year, and he sees the stock, which closed yesterday at $10.54, skidding to $7 over the next 12 months.

Meanwhile, he views the overall airline industry in “the early stages of positive meaningful change,” citing rising fares, which are helping to recover much of the higher fuel costs, and elimination by bankrupt airlines of a hefty 4% to 5% of their supply of seats. His top stock picks: AMR and Continental Airlines.