The Federal Trade Commission used a lawsuit against multifamily giant Greystar as a warning to anyone managing a residential rental property that “nothing good” happens when advertised rental prices don’t reflect what tenants ultimately pay.
“The FTC and the State of Colorado allege that Greystar — which advertises hundreds of thousands of rental units on its website, third-party websites, and websites for individual buildings and complexes — regularly misrepresented the total cost of renting an apartment by excluding mandatory fees from the price it advertised to consumers,” they wrote.
The FTC’s blog post alleged that, often, consumers who saw an ad for a Greystar apartment could only learn about the hidden fees after reaching the application portal or completing an inquiry form that required personal information.
The FTC offered three points for property managers, property management software providers, rental property owners, or those advertising rental properties. One, a rental price that doesn’t include mandatory charges is a legal violation, so an ad should show the total rental cost.
Second, the agency said to run a compliance check on a website or advertisements to ensure that the full rental price is displayed. “That includes working with your third-party vendors to make sure they’re accurately advertising the rental price on all their platforms,” they wrote.
Third, the FTC said that it is “reviewing harmful practices in the rental housing market and will not hesitate to take action against landlords taking advantage of Americans’ housing needs by hiding mandatory fees.”
Thelawsuit had been brought by the FTC and Colorado in January 2025, alleging that Greystar “falsely advertises rental prices that do not include numerous mandatory fees, adding up to hundreds of millions of dollars.” The agency said that the practices violated the FTC Act, Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act, and the Colorado Consumer Protection Act.
Greystar agreed to pay $24 million. In its ownpost about the lawsuit, the company noted that it had made no admission of wrongdoing and that it “continues to maintain, as it has from the start of this matter, that its advertising has always been transparent, fair, and fully consistent with the longstanding industrywide practice of advertising base rent to potential residents.” The company also said that it had “long championed transparency in the rental housing industry.”
© Arc, All Rights Reserved. Request academic re-use from www.copyright.com. All other uses, submit a request to TMSalesOperations@arc-network.com. For more information visit Asset & Logo Licensing.