U.S. Attorney Sandra J. Hairston | U.S. Department of Justice
The Justice Department, in collaboration with state co-plaintiffs, has filed an amended complaint in its antitrust lawsuit against RealPage. The lawsuit targets six major landlords accused of engaging in algorithmic pricing schemes that allegedly harmed renters across the United States.
The landlords named in the complaint include Greystar Real Estate Partners LLC, Blackstone’s LivCor LLC, Camden Property Trust, Cushman & Wakefield Inc., Willow Bridge Property Company LLC, and Cortland Management LLC. These companies collectively manage over 1.3 million rental units across 43 states and the District of Columbia. The Attorneys General of Illinois and Massachusetts have joined the lawsuit as co-plaintiffs, bringing the total number of State and Commonwealth co-plaintiffs to ten.
Acting Assistant Attorney General Doha Mekki from the Justice Department’s Antitrust Division stated: “While Americans across the country struggled to afford housing, the landlords named in today’s lawsuit shared sensitive information about rental prices and used algorithms to coordinate to keep the price of rent high.”
The complaint accuses these landlords of using each other's competitively sensitive information through common pricing algorithms provided by RealPage. Alleged activities include direct communication between senior managers about rents and occupancy rates, conducting "call arounds" or market surveys to discuss pricing strategies, participating in user groups hosted by RealPage to modify software pricing methodologies, and sharing software parameters.
In a related move, a proposed consent decree was announced against Cortland Management LLC. If approved by the court, this would resolve claims against Cortland. Under this decree, Cortland is required to cooperate with the ongoing investigation and refrain from using competitors' data for pricing models without oversight.
The Tunney Act mandates that this proposed consent decree will be published in the Federal Register for public comment over a 60-day period before final judgment can be entered by the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of North Carolina.
Co-plaintiffs involved are Attorneys General from California, Colorado, Connecticut, Illinois, Massachusetts, Minnesota, North Carolina, Oregon, Tennessee, and Washington.
Greystar is based in Charleston; LivCor and Cushman & Wakefield are headquartered in Chicago; Willow Bridge operates out of Dallas; Camden is located in Houston; while Cortland is headquartered in Atlanta. These companies manage multifamily apartment buildings with some owning properties under their management.
