webinar
Apartments.com
What Price Transparency Laws Mean for Your Apartments.com Listings
As a growing number of states mandate price transparency, Apartments.com is making it easy for you to keep your listings compliant with the new laws.
In this on-demand webinar, Apartments.com’s Stuart Richens, vice president of product, explains what to do to ensure your Apartments.com listings meet legal requirements and renter expectations.
The latest changes reflect Apartments.com’s continued role at the forefront of price transparency.
What is price transparency?
In response to renter demand, a growing number of states are requiring multifamily properties to list prices in a clear and consistent way.
Price is consistently renters’ top consideration when choosing a place to live. But figuring out exactly how much a given rental unit might cost can be difficult.
Many properties advertise their base rent — but charge additional required fees, such as an amenity fee, a technology fee, or a trash and recycling fee. Once these required fees are factored in, the total monthly cost might be significantly higher than the base rent initially shown.
To address this, new price transparency laws typically require properties to:
- Advertise the total monthly price, including all required monthly fees, rather than the base rent
- Display the lease term for the given price (such as 12 months)
This approach aligns with renters’ expectations.
Nearly eight in 10 renters express a preference for seeing the total price listed, according to a recent Apartments.com survey.
“Most renters say that surprise fees are a real dealbreaker,” Richens said.
And nearly half of renters report that they’ve actually crossed a property off their list after encountering unexpected fees, Richens said.
When and where price transparency laws are going into effect
A number of states are implementing price transparency laws this year:
- Massachusetts’ price transparency law went into effect September 2
- Connecticut and Nevada laws will go into effect October 1, 2025
- The Colorado law will go into effective January 1, 2026
Laws governing price transparency have also been passed in Minnesota, and changes to Apartments.com’s presentation of pricing information for Minnesota properties are currently live.
What’s changing in your Apartments.com listing
In affected states, Apartments.com is introducing several new features to make it easier for properties to stay compliant with price transparency laws.
Highlighting compliant properties with a “Total Monthly Price” badge
When properties provide full pricing information, the “Total Monthly Price” label will appear next to their price within search results and on their listing page.
Renters can hover over the price to see a full breakdown of base rent and required fees.
At the same time, properties that do not make their full fee schedule available will have the label “Plus Fees” displayed next to their listed price.
Higher placement in search results
Properties with transparent pricing will enjoy higher ranking within the search results for their ad package.
“We want to reward those communities that comply with the new state laws by providing renters with valuable pricing data,” Richen said.
Apples-to-apples comparisons in sorting and filtered search
Until total prices are available for all properties, Apartments.com will use base rent to compare properties in search results.
This apples-to-apple comparison will avoid penalizing the properties that provide full pricing information.
When a renter searches for a specific price range, or sorts the search results by low to high price, the results will reflect the base rent of compliant properties and the base rent of properties that do not provide total pricing, thus providing a fair comparison.
How to make sure your listings are compliant
To keep your listings compliant, make sure Apartments.com has the complete and up-to-date pricing information for your properties. You can do so in the following ways:
- Sync your listing to a feed to automatically display pricing information from Entrata, Engrain, Funnel, RealPage, or RentCafé (with AppFolio coming in 2026).
- Log in to your Apartments.com portal and manually enter your full fee schedule.
- If you do not charge any additional fees, log in to your Apartments.com portal and check the box indicating that your total price does not include extra fees.
Why does price transparency matter?
In recent years, the topic of price transparency has gained traction within the multifamily industry, thanks to renter demand and legal requirements. Apartments.com has played a leadership role in highlighting the issue at industry events, working with software providers to develop appropriate solutions, and drawing attention to the matter in webinars.
But price transparency isn’t just a matter of legal compliance. Properties that opt for more transparent pricing can also enjoy advantages when it comes to filling their vacancies.
“Price transparency creates higher quality leads, it reduces friction in the leasing process, it boosts renter satisfaction and community reputation, and it leads to a more efficient overall leasing process,” Richens said.
Learn more about price transparency
For more on price transparency, check out these resources:
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