The property management software company RealPage Inc. has upgraded its product line to enable users to remove its nonpublic competitor data when calculating rent recommendations.
The Richardson, Texas-based company said the upgrade comes in the wake of the Sept. 3 ordinance passed by the San Francisco Board of Supervisors that prohibits housing providers in the Bay Area city from using certain software and algorithms to help set rents. In making the change, RealPage noted that its three revenue management software products collectively serve only 10% of San Francisco’s rental housing units while adding that its revenue management products can be similarly configurable in other jurisdictions that might face similar prohibitions.
However, the company stressed that its products should not be blamed for the expensive rents in the San Francisco housing market.
“While RealPage shares the San Francisco Board of Supervisors’ goal of helping renters, this ordinance will do nothing to make housing more affordable in the city, where there is a severe supply shortage of rental units that needs to be addressed,” said the company in a statement. “The San Francisco ordinance’s misplaced focus on nonpublic information is a distraction that will only make San Francisco’s historical problems worse by banning an important component of pricing technology that RealPage uses responsibly and that benefits residents, property managers and the rental housing ecosystem as a whole.”
The company’s statement added, “As other California jurisdictions consider whether to adopt similar policies, they should be mindful that nonpublic historical effective rent data is on average lower than publicly available asking rent data for corresponding properties, due to common discounting and concession practices and other factors. As a result, public policies that outlaw the responsible use of nonpublic data should not be assumed to be a benefit for renters, or for housing providers who seek to set rent prices that will result in promptly filling their available units.”
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