Committee adopts amendments and refers ordinance banning algorithmic rental price‑fixing to full council

The Homelessness and Housing Committee on March 25 approved amendments and referred to full council an ordinance designed to prohibit algorithmic rental price‑fixing and related price‑setting tools.

Councilor Carmen Murillo introduced the ordinance, which she said responds to federal investigations and growing concerns that software used by some property managers and landlords can coordinate rents across competing properties. "Price fixing is an anti competitive agreement among competitors to raise, lower, maintain, or stabilize prices," attorney Angelo Pisido of Local Progress told the committee during the presentation on the legal basis for the ordinance.

Presenters from the city and advocacy groups said companies such as RealPage provide revenue‑management products that collect rent and vacancy data from many landlords, estimate supply and demand for narrowly defined unit types, and recommend daily price changes that the Department of Justice and others have said can amount to collusion. Smart City PDX staff described algorithms as rules that transform inputs into outputs and warned about opacity and bias when algorithms operate with limited transparency.

City staff and the city attorney’s office described the ordinance’s three broad prohibitions: (1) sharing competitively sensitive information with other landlords or price‑setting tool operators, (2) using or entering agreements to use a price‑setting tool (including charging rent that was determined with such a tool), and (3) selling or licensing price‑setting tools. Susie Duister, Councilor Murillo’s policy adviser, said the language clarifies that the ordinance targets anti‑competitive coordination rather than ordinary market research or commonly available listing services.

The committee approved an amendment to the draft ordinance (roll call on the amendment: Murillo — aye; Zimmerman — no; Dunphy — aye; Avalos — aye) and then voted to refer the ordinance, as amended, to full council (roll call on referral: Zimmerman — no; Dunphy — aye; Murillo — aye; Avalos — aye). City Attorney Tony Garcia said the draft provides both a private right of action for tenants and a city enforcement path; the city’s enforcement section includes subpoena authority for the City Attorney’s Office and civil penalties payable to the city. Garcia also described a $10,000 cap alternative for private damages to ease the evidentiary burden on tenants and a five‑year statute of limitations for violations.

Opponents’ concerns raised during committee exchange and in written correspondence included questions about whether the ordinance could unintentionally limit small landlords’ normal practices (for example, advice from a property manager who works with multiple small clients), how the city will distinguish public versus competitively sensitive private data, and whether city enforcement should be handled through the city attorney rather than code compliance. Councilor Zimmerman voted no on both the amendment and the referral and said he was troubled by the pace of the process and potential impacts on mom‑and‑pop landlords. Supporters said the ordinance addresses new technology used to produce traditional antitrust harms and could limit a systemic driver of rent increases.

The ordinance amends Portland City Code chapter 30 and uses language that staff said aligns with existing antitrust principles; it will next appear on a full‑council agenda for additional public testimony and possible final action.