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> While RealPage might command 80% of the market for this type of software, they only have 12,000 clients. There are over 5.2 million multi-family dwellings in

> While RealPage might command 80% of the market for this type of software, they only have 12,000 clients. There are over 5.2 million multi-family dwellings in the US. It's only a monopoly in that they offer a very niche product. So I doubt the implication the justice department is making here - that RealPage is having a significant impact on market price through widespread collusion. Well, given your only justification for your doubt is that you compared clients to multifamily dwellings, I gotta say, your doubt is pretty not founded in reality. > Furthermore, housing is a market - nobody is "competing on merits". Oof, bro. "Competing on merits" is the entire justification for why free markets are important. If you're arguing that nobody is competing on merits, then that starts to sound like you're arguing that competition isn't working here. > Realpage advertising that it gets the best dollar for its clients isn't that much different than your Schwab account letting you know you shouldn't sell your MSFT share for $50. The difference being that Schwab doesn't have the pull to price-fix MSFT. In cases where a single coordinates to control 80% of shares of a stock and then price-fix it, that is, in fact, illegal. > While I appreciate the breaking up of a potential cartel here, and this is a software I would never use, I would hold my breath if I was expecting a sudden change in the rental market because of this. Inventory is still fundamentally limited, and unless the DOJ bans all market research, the going rate is still the going rate. I agree with you that housing prices are not likely to drastically change as a result of this, but my reason is that this isn't the only price-fixing mechanism in place.

legitster 2y ago
Competition clearly isn't working for housing. Because it's not a competitive market. I am just skeptical to the extent it is due to pricing cartels.
- bluGill 2y ago
  It is a competitive market. However supply is often supply constrained (both by bad zoning and that some places are just better than others). The cartels only work because supply is constrained enough that they have power, if supply was less constrained the cartel could not raise prices as much (when supply is constrained you need less members in the first place). I support looser zoning rules as reducing supply constraints is the only long term way out of high rents. However some places are better than others and there is a limit to how much looser zoning can reduce prices. (I wouldn't live in a tiny mud hut even if it was cheap and legal)
  - gen220 2y ago
    If we loosen zoning, and a half-dozen skyrises go up that are owned by a ~cartel~ group of friendly property developers, with X% of housing required to go to low-to-middle income households with a govt-required vacancy rate on that segment, do you think that would make rental prices go down? Because we've run this experiment in Downtown Brooklyn for the last ten years, and rent has only gone very significantly up. I think, at some point, you have to begin asking questions of the concept of nonresident landlordism and privately-owned massively-multifamily housing, rather than zoning, when changes to zoning don't actually make a difference to residents.
    - bluGill 2y ago
      A half dozen isn't much. The real question is how would it be different. I contend it would have been worse but we cannot know.
      - gen220 2y ago
        I guess it was closer to a dozen if you add up all the smaller ones. City tower, the Death Star looking one, the Alexa looking one, the 3 or 4 medium sized ones on Gold St, the Brooklyner, the 5 or 6 medium sized ones on Hoyt, the One with the Apple Store, the three or four around Barclays Center. We’re talking about residential space for 10s of thousands of people that completely changed the vibe of the neighborhood for better and worse. You don’t need the counter factual to look at the prices they’re leasing for. Or to understand that the wealthy folk in these buildings look down at the cutesy brownstones and think to themselves “oh it’d be nice to live in one of those next!”. To realize that the influx of monied people and the accompanying influx of goods and services to pander to them induces top-end demand for the neighborhood and inflates rent. The kind of high-density housing we build in this country does not deflate housing prices. To clarify, it might be different if the neighborhoods surrounding this area were not majority owned by nonresident landlords, often the children of the original purchasers. Increased supply solves pricing when you have a competitive and free market, but the point people in this thread are trying to make is that housing (especially in urban areas) is not at all a free and competitive market. Landlords can afford to let an apartment lay fallow. However, people not only need places to live, but they believe that they can’t afford (socially, career-wise, whatever) to leave a set of zip codes. It leads to rent being a one-way ratchet that dramatically outpaces wage growth and inflation.

legitster 2y ago

Competition clearly isn't working for housing. Because it's not a competitive market. I am just skeptical to the extent it is due to pricing cartels.

bluGill 2y ago
It is a competitive market. However supply is often supply constrained (both by bad zoning and that some places are just better than others). The cartels only work because supply is constrained enough that they have power, if supply was less constrained the cartel could not raise prices as much (when supply is constrained you need less members in the first place). I support looser zoning rules as reducing supply constraints is the only long term way out of high rents. However some places are better than others and there is a limit to how much looser zoning can reduce prices. (I wouldn't live in a tiny mud hut even if it was cheap and legal)
- gen220 2y ago
  If we loosen zoning, and a half-dozen skyrises go up that are owned by a ~cartel~ group of friendly property developers, with X% of housing required to go to low-to-middle income households with a govt-required vacancy rate on that segment, do you think that would make rental prices go down? Because we've run this experiment in Downtown Brooklyn for the last ten years, and rent has only gone very significantly up. I think, at some point, you have to begin asking questions of the concept of nonresident landlordism and privately-owned massively-multifamily housing, rather than zoning, when changes to zoning don't actually make a difference to residents.
  - bluGill 2y ago
    A half dozen isn't much. The real question is how would it be different. I contend it would have been worse but we cannot know.
    - gen220 2y ago
      I guess it was closer to a dozen if you add up all the smaller ones. City tower, the Death Star looking one, the Alexa looking one, the 3 or 4 medium sized ones on Gold St, the Brooklyner, the 5 or 6 medium sized ones on Hoyt, the One with the Apple Store, the three or four around Barclays Center. We’re talking about residential space for 10s of thousands of people that completely changed the vibe of the neighborhood for better and worse. You don’t need the counter factual to look at the prices they’re leasing for. Or to understand that the wealthy folk in these buildings look down at the cutesy brownstones and think to themselves “oh it’d be nice to live in one of those next!”. To realize that the influx of monied people and the accompanying influx of goods and services to pander to them induces top-end demand for the neighborhood and inflates rent. The kind of high-density housing we build in this country does not deflate housing prices. To clarify, it might be different if the neighborhoods surrounding this area were not majority owned by nonresident landlords, often the children of the original purchasers. Increased supply solves pricing when you have a competitive and free market, but the point people in this thread are trying to make is that housing (especially in urban areas) is not at all a free and competitive market. Landlords can afford to let an apartment lay fallow. However, people not only need places to live, but they believe that they can’t afford (socially, career-wise, whatever) to leave a set of zip codes. It leads to rent being a one-way ratchet that dramatically outpaces wage growth and inflation.