Important thing to point out based on your desires.

Compared to places in the South like Austin, "newer" doesn't really exist in Providence. I can think of maybe at the most 20 buildings/complexes within the city limits finished in the past ten years off the top of my head. There might be more newer (less than 30 years old) builds in suburbs like Cranston, Warwick or North Providence.

Most housing in Providence city limits is two-three bedroom apartment in hundred-year old triple deckers (wooden tenement buildings). I am not kidding about this. When I think back on where I lived and most of my friends lived when I lived in Providence I can think of maybe four people whose place didn't match that description, and only one was in a new building.

One of the reasons Providence is always so high in national rent rankings is that there aren't many one bedrooms compared to most other cities in the US, and those rankings are usually between one bedrooms. If you compare two bedrooms, Providence goes down a bit (though it's still not cheap).