Boston officials plan to investigate how broker’s fees impact the city’s hundreds of thousands of renters, raising the possibility of a New York City-style ban on them and thorny questions about how to make the city’s housing market fairer.
On its face, the idea seems ridiculous: With online apartment search tools so common, why should renters pay $2,000 or more to a person whose only visible service appears to be unlocking the door for a viewing? With the vacancy rate so tight, these fees often leave renters feeling like fish in a barrel.
The palpable resentment many renters have for having to pay effectively three month’s rent – the rent itself, plus a security deposit and broker’s fee each often equivalent to another month’s rent – makes the task force on broker fees Mayor Marty Walsh proclaimed recently so necessary. This burden falls even harder the less a renter makes. The status quo is not working for enough people, and a solution must be sought.
Walsh promised to include “a broad range of stakeholders” in this commission, although his office had not announced the body’s makeup as of this writing. To stay true to this promise and have any hope of finding a realistic way forward, he must ensure both landlords and real estate agents have seats at the table. A working group dominated by tenant advocates will not produce any legitimate recommendations in the eyes of the industry.
It is important the public know that real estate agents do more in this process than unlock an apartment door and flip a few light switches. There is a body of administrative work they must manage behind the scenes, including fielding calls from legions of would-be renters. Many still do the traditional, more difficult work of ferreting out upcoming vacancies and pairing aspiring tenants with landlords.
It is just as important that industry listen to renters’ perspectives. In an age of $2,000-plus monthly rents for one-bedroom apartments, slow wage growth, online listings and an electorate that appears at best suspicious of the real estate industry, asking hard-working renters to come up with thousands of dollars up front is not a winning strategy.
Whatever drama unfolds at City Hall and on Beacon Hill – city regulation of broker fees would likely require a home rule petition – it can’t take away attention from the real problem immiserating renters and homebuyers alike. The state’s suburbs don’t pull anything like their weight when it comes to allowing housing production, particularly of multifamily buildings, keeping supply unnaturally tight and driving prices ever upwards.
In this situation, eliminating apartment broker fees and calling it a win for the little guy would be like spitting on a forest fire and walking away.
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