chronicles how RealPage's YieldStar software helps landlords set prices for apartments across the U.S.Legal experts wonder whether the Richardson-based company has created a new kind of cartel allowing the nation's largest landlords to indirectly fix rent prices, potentially in violation of federal law.
A company representative told ProPublica that RealPage "uses aggregated market data from a variety of sources in a legally compliant manner."For years, RealPage has sold software that uses data analytics to suggest daily prices for open units. Property managers have gushed about how the company's algorithm boosts profits.
RealPage discourages bargaining with renters and recommends that landlords sometimes accept lower occupancy rates in order to raise rents and make more money. One of the algorithm's developers told ProPublica that leasing agents had "too much empathy" compared to computer generated pricing.RealPage became the nation's biggest provider of rent-setting software in 2017 after federal regulators approved a controversial merger with its biggest rival, Lease Rent Options, the ProPublica investigation found.
"The beauty of YieldStar is that it pushes you to go places that you wouldn't have gone if you weren't using it," Kortney Balas, director of revenue management at JVM Realty, says in a testimonial video on the company's website.
Texas is the new Florida; only with less gators but more guns and just as much corruption.
$AVB $ESS $MAA and $EQR all benefited from RealPages
cool. Just hastening the collapse.
See it is the companies..
Alrighty Then let’s Shut them Down and file some big lawsuits against them!
Government interference in the housing markets is causing high rents. This article is BS.
This makes me sick…
Ah. It’s Texas’s fault.