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RealPage Algorithm Allegedly Inflates Rents and Reduces Competition in Housing Market

14 news reports Snapshot 7 Sep 2026

In brief

An AI system built by Thoma Bravo, Realpage and 1 other and deployed by Realpage allegedly harmed Renters.

Risk domain
Socioeconomic & Environmental Harms Increased inequality and decline in employment quality
Occurred
Coverage
14 reportsOct 2022 - Jan 2025

What happened

RealPage’s YieldStar pricing algorithm is at the center of allegations that it enabled landlords to coordinate rent increases by sharing nonpublic pricing and occupancy data, raising rents artificially and reducing competition. On January 7, 2025, the U.S. Department of Justice filed an antitrust lawsuit against six major landlords, alleging that they used the algorithm and other direct communication methods to stifle competition, harming renters nationwide.

Laws that address this harm

Policy angle: Classified under Socioeconomic & Environmental Harms (Increased inequality and decline in employment quality) in the MIT AI Risk Repository taxonomy; 5 recorded instruments address this use case.

Matched from the record's risk domain and country to the instruments recorded here. A reviewer can correct the match in the repository (data/external/incident_overrides.yaml).

News reports (14)

Titles link to the original publisher; report text is not reproduced here.

  1. How a Secret Rent Algorithm Pushes Rents Higher
    propublica.org · Heather Vogell, Haru Coryne, Ryan Little
  2. RealPage’s YieldStar Software May Be Driving Up Rents
    therealdeal.com · Pat Ralph
  3. Is an Algorithm Raising Your Rent? A New Class Action Lawsuit Says Yes
    gizmodo.com · Lucas Ropek
  4. Company that makes rent-setting software for landlords sued for collusion
    arstechnica.com · Heather Vogell
  5. The DOJ Has Opened an Investigation Into RealPage
    propublica.org · Heather Vogell
  6. 14 big landlords used software to collude on rent prices, DC lawsuit says
    arstechnica.com · Kevin Purdy
  7. Why U.S. renters are taking corporate landlords to court
    cnbc.com · Carlos Waters
  8. How an ‘Algorithm’ Turned Apartment Pools Green
    prospect.org · Maureen Tkacik
  9. Landlords Used Software to Set Rents. Then Came the Lawsuits.
    nytimes.com · Danielle Kaye
  10. DOJ accuses tech firm RealPage of enabling landlords to collude on rents
    nypost.com · Ariel Zilber
  11. Shiny New Technology, Same Old Funny Business
    nytimes.com · Binyamin Appelbaum
  12. Justice Department Sues Six Large Landlords for Algorithmic Pricing Scheme that Harms Millions of American Renters
    justice.gov · United States Department of Justice
  13. US sues six of the biggest landlords over “algorithmic pricing schemes”
    arstechnica.com · Jon Brodkin
  14. Landlords are accused of colluding to raise rents. See where.
    washingtonpost.com · Alyssa Fowers, Szu Yu Chen, Steven Rich

Who was involved

Alleged deployer
Realpage
Alleged harmed party
Renters

Classification (MIT AI Risk Repository taxonomy)

Causal entity
AI
Intent
Intentional
Timing
Post-deployment
Harm level
—
Sectors
—
Countries
—

Risk entries describing this failure mode

Entries from the MIT AI Risk Repository coded to subdomain 6.2.

  • Labour exploitation

    "Labour exploitation - Use of under-paid and/or offshore labour to develop, manage or optimise a technology system."

    A Collaborative, Human-Centred Taxonomy of AI, Algorithmic, and Automation Harms (Abercrombie2024)

  • Societal destabilisation

    "Societal destabilisation - Societal instability in the form of strikes, demonstrations and other types of civil unrest caused by loss of jobs to technology, unfair algorithmic outcomes, disinformation, etc."

    A Collaborative, Human-Centred Taxonomy of AI, Algorithmic, and Automation Harms (Abercrombie2024)

  • Political instability

    "Political instability - Political polarisation or unrest caused by increased inequality, job losses, over- dependence on technology making societies vulnerable to systemic failures, etc, arising from or amplified by the...

    A Collaborative, Human-Centred Taxonomy of AI, Algorithmic, and Automation Harms (Abercrombie2024)

  • Job loss/losses

    "Job loss/losses - Replacement/displacement of human jobs by a technology system, leading to increased unemployment, inequality, reduced consumer spending, and social friction."

    A Collaborative, Human-Centred Taxonomy of AI, Algorithmic, and Automation Harms (Abercrombie2024)

  • Societal inequality

    "Societal inequality - Increased difference in social status or wealth between individuals or groups caused or amplified by a technology system, leading to the loss of social and community wellbeing/cohesion and destabil...

    A Collaborative, Human-Centred Taxonomy of AI, Algorithmic, and Automation Harms (Abercrombie2024)

  • Economic

    "AI is predicted to bring increased GDP per capita by performing existing jobs more efficiently and compensating for a decline in the workforce, especially due to population aging, the potential substitution of many low-...

    The Rise of Artificial Intelligence - Future Outlooks and Emerging Risks (Allianz2018)

  • Increased income disparity

    "While AI is predicted to bring increased GDP per capita by performing existing jobs more efficiently and compensating for a decline in the workforce, especially due to population aging, the potential substitution of man...

    The Rise of Artificial Intelligence - Future Outlooks and Emerging Risks (Allianz2018)

  • Effects on the Workforce

    "Rapid advances in LLMs pose three distinct sets of challenges for workers’ incomes (Korinek and Stiglitz, 2019; Susskind, 2023). First, they are likely to accelerate the rate of job turnover and disruption —– affecting...

    Foundational Challenges in Assuring Alignment and Safety of Large Language Models (Anwar2024)

Incidents in the same risk subdomain

All incidents in this subdomain

Source record: incident #376 on the AI Incident Database · all 14 reports