Company that makes rent-setting software for landlords sued for collusion

RealPage worked with some of the nation’s largest landlords to raise rents, says lawsuit.

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[TroubleMan]

A lot of people are wondering in the comments if this is illegal or just a innovative use of software.

If you read the pro-publica article, it's clearly collusion.

All these landlords (mostly big companies, but not all of them) are giving their data to an algorithm, and that algorithm tells them what prices they should be selling at.

Now replace the word "algorithm" with "a guy named Bob."

All these landlords are giving their data to a guy named Bob, and Bob is telling them what prices they should be selling at.

If it's illegal for "a guy named Bob" to do then it's also illegal for an algorithm to do.

 

[TroubleMan]

A lot of people are wondering in the comments if this is illegal or just a innovative use of software.

If you read the pro-publica article, it's clearly collusion.

All these landlords (mostly big companies, but not all of them) are giving their data to an algorithm, and that algorithm tells them what prices they should be selling at.

Now replace the word "algorithm" with "a guy named Bob."

All these landlords are giving their data to a guy named Bob, and Bob is telling them what prices they should be selling at.

If it's illegal for "a guy named Bob" to do then it's also illegal for an algorithm to do.

Agreed.

Which Federal law exactly is Bob violating though?

As far as I'm aware, that would just be called a 'pricing consultant' or a 'pricing analyst' and that is a legal career path with many available jobs as a quick Google search will show.

What is a Pricing Analyst?

A pricing analyst is responsible for analyzing competitor pricing matched with market expectations to determine the ideal target price for products of the business. Duties include providing thorough analytical breakdowns of pricing structures and sales funnels of similar competitor products and services and identifying specific strategies used in pricing models of the same. Reports are written in order to evaluate the findings and to propose the results to the relevant departments for effect. Depending on the company, pricing analysts may progress into managerial roles involving financial account management and analysis.

https://www.glassdoor.com/Job-Descripti ... nalyst.htm

As far as I can tell that is exactly what the software is doing.

Are you saying the entire field is illegal somehow and nobody has noticed, or am I missing your point?

You are missing the point. If multiple, competing competing companies all hired the same exact person as a pricing consultant, then that pricing consultant told them how to set their prices based on the private date provided to him by those companies, that is 100% illegal. It's called price fixing.

You're looking at it as if each company had their own price consultant, which made independent judgements on pricing for each company. That's not happening. It's all of the companies hiring "a guy named Bob," giving him private data, and setting their prices based on his knowledge of that private data.