Justice Department Sues Large Landlords for Algorithmic Pricing Scheme that Harms Millions of American Renters
INTRODUCTION
1. From at least January 2016, through the present (the “Conspiracy Period”), Defendants engaged in a nationwide conspiracy to fix and inflate the price of multifamily rental housing across the country. Leveraging their control of the multifamily rental housing market from at least January 2016, Defendants conspired to limit supply and raise multifamily rental housing [rents,leases].
Excerpts—US DOJ and Multiple Plaintiff US States vs. Defendants…
NATURE OF THE ACTION
1. This action arises from Defendants’ conspiracy to fix, raise, maintain, and stabilize rental housing prices in the Miami,¹ Orlando, Jacksonville, and Tampa,² Florida housing markets (the “Greater Miami Metro Area,” “Greater Orlando Metro Area,” “Greater Jacksonville Metro Area,” and “Greater Tampa Metro Area,” respectively).
2. Defendants are RealPage, Inc. (“RealPage”), the developer of a software platform called “AI Revenue Management” (previously known as “YieldStar”), and several managers of [multifamily rental properties].
¹ As used throughout this Complaint, the Greater Miami Metro Area is coterminous with the Miami-Fort Lauderdale-Pompano Beach, FL Metropolitan Statistical Area, as established by the United States Office of Management and Budget. Specifically, the Greater Miami Metro Area consists of the Florida cities of Boca Raton, Boynton Beach, Coral Gables, Deerfield Beach, Delray Beach, Doral, Fort Lauderdale, Jupiter, Kendall, Miami, Miami Beach, Palm Beach Gardens, Pompano Beach, Sunrise, West Palm Beach, and surrounding areas. References to Miami throughout this Complaint, unless specifically limited, refer to the Greater Miami Metro Area.
Owner-Operator Defendants
159. Owner-Operator Defendants The Related Companies L.P. and Related Management Company L.P. (collectively, “Related”) are respectively, a property owner and property manager, and acted as a single economic unit. Both are incorporated and headquartered in New York, New York. Related operates in at least the following regional submarkets: Atlanta, [and others].
160. During the Conspiracy Period, Related entered into a written contract, paid for, and used at least one RealPage RMS—LRO—to manage some or all of its more than 65,000 multifamily rental units nationwide, knowing that doing so required it to share confidential, competitively sensitive pricing and lease information with its horizontal competitors in order to allow them to adjust their rental prices, and in turn, to allow Defendant Related to benefit from its horizontal competitors’ sensitive pricing and lease information before it set or adjusted its own [prices].
161. By agreeing to regularly share confidential, competitively sensitive pricing and lease information with horizontal competitors in order to allow them to adjust prices, Related agreed to join a cartel with those horizontal competitors. The conspiracy resulted in higher prices for multifamily residential leases across the nation and in each submarket in which Related operates. Related would not have paid for RealPage’s RMS pricing services unless: (1) doing so enabled it to set prices above a competitive level; and (2) it knew its competitors were, likewise, using RealPage RMS to set their rental prices in the submarkets in which it operated.
Excerpts.*********
If you paid rent for an apartment owned or managed by any of the below-listed companies at any time from October 18, 2018 through November 21, 2025, you may be entitled to money from $141,800,000 in settlements.
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Allied Orion Group, LLC
Apartment Income REIT Corp., d/b/a AIR Communities
Apartment Management Consultants, LLC
Avenue5 Residential, LLC
Bell Partners, Inc.
BH Management Services, LLC
Bozzuto Management Company
Brookfield Properties Multifamily LLC
Camden Property Trust
CH Real Estate Services, LLC
CONAM Management Corporation
CONTI Texas Organization, Inc., d/b/a CONTI Capital
Cortland Management, LLC
Cortland Partners, LLC
Crow Holdings, LP
CWS Apartment Homes LLC
Dayrise Residential, LLC
ECI Group, Inc.
Equity Residential
Essex Property Trust, Inc.
First Communities Management, Inc.
FPI Management, Inc.
Greystar Management Services, LLC
Highmark Residential, LLC
Independence Realty Trust, Inc.
Kairoi Management, LLC
Knightvest Residential
Lantower Luxury Living, LLC
Lincoln Property Co.
Mid-America Apartments, L.P.
Mid-America Communities, Inc.
Mission Rock Residential, LLC
Morgan Properties Management Co., LLC
Pinnacle Property Management Services, LLC
Prometheus Real Estate Group, Inc.
Related Management Company L.P.
Rose Associates, Inc.
RPM Living, LLC
Sares Regis Group Commercial, Inc.
Security Properties Residential, LLC
Sherman Associates, Inc.
Simpson Property Group, LLC
The Related Companies, L.P.
Thrive Communities Management, LLC
Trammell Crow Residential Company
UDR, Inc.
Windsor Property Management Company
Winn Residential Manager Corp.
WinnCompanies LLC
ZRS Management, LLC
