RICHARDSON, Texas--(BUSINESS WIRE)--RealPage®, the leading global provider of AI-enabled software platforms to the real estate industry, today announced that its revenue management software customers have the ability to remove the use of nonpublic competitor data when calculating rent recommendations.
RealPage’s response to the San Francisco ordinance
The San Francisco Board of Supervisors on September 3 passed an ordinance that essentially bans housing providers in San Francisco from using certain software and algorithms to help set rents. Of note, RealPage’s three revenue management software products collectively serve only 10% of the rental housing units in San Francisco.
RealPage’s revenue management software is purposely built to be legally compliant, and it is also highly configurable to remain compliant as laws and policies change. RealPage is complying with the new law by eliminating the use of nonpublic competitor data of non-user properties for calculating rent recommendations in San Francisco. All revenue management products offered by RealPage are similarly configurable in any other jurisdiction at the option of its customers.
RealPage offers a choice to its customers
All RealPage revenue management customers – wherever their properties are located – have the ability to remove nonpublic data from the calculation of rent recommendations if they choose. RealPage’s revenue management software provides value to its customers in all of its configurations, and the company has no plans to sunset any of its solutions. While the use of nonpublic data in the highly aggregated, anonymized and blended manner currently applied by RealPage has benefits to subscribers and renters that lead to more competitive pricing in the housing ecosystem, RealPage is committed to giving customers options on which products to use.
Housing affordability should be the real focus
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.
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.
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.
About Revenue Management Software
RealPage revenue management software offers prospective residents and housing providers more options and flexibility in lease terms, enhances customer competitiveness through more agile pricing to fill vacancies and reducing costs, aids compliance with Fair Housing laws, does not use any personal or demographic data to generate rent price recommendations and helps ensure that prospective residents have access to the best pricing available to everyone.
RealPage has developed an educational website for more information: www.realpagepublicpolicy.com.
About RealPage, Inc.:
RealPage is the leading global provider of AI-enabled software platforms to the real estate industry. By using RealPage solutions for operational excellence in the front office and throughout property operations, many leading property owners, operators and investors gain transparency into asset performance with data insights, enhancing experiences with customized tools and improving efficiencies to generate incremental yield. In 2021, 2022, 2023 and 2024, RealPage was recognized as ENERGY STAR® Partner of the Year for Sustained Excellence from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the U.S. Department of Energy. In 2024, RealPage was recognized in America’s Best Employers and America’s Best Employers for Women by Forbes, as well as in America’s Greatest Workplaces for Women by Newsweek. Founded in 1998 and headquartered in Richardson, Texas, RealPage joined the Thoma Bravo portfolio of market-leading enterprise software firms in 2021 to realize faster growth and innovation in serving more than 24 million rental units from offices in North America, Europe and Asia. RealPage has been certified as a Great Place to Work in India, the Philippines, the UK and the U.S. For more information, visit https://www.RealPage.com.
