The main Yardi lawsuit is a nationwide antitrust class action filed in September 2023 in federal court in Seattle, accusing the property management software company of helping landlords fix apartment rents through its Revenue IQ algorithm, formerly called RENTmaximizer. Renters say the software let competing landlords quietly coordinate on prices roughly 6% above competitive levels.1Hagens Berman. Yardi Rent Price-Fixing Antitrust Nationwide The case is still active in mid-2026, though Yardi has already won a parallel California suit on summary judgment.2PACER Monitor. Duffy v. Yardi Systems Inc. Et Al.
What Renters Are Accusing Yardi Of
The lead case is Duffy v. Yardi Systems, Inc., Case No. 2:23-cv-01391-RSL, pending before Judge Robert S. Lasnik in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington. The plaintiffs, represented by Hagens Berman, describe a “hub-and-spoke” conspiracy: Yardi is the hub that collects sensitive, nonpublic data from competing landlords and feeds it into a centralized pricing engine, while the property managers are the spokes that outsource their rent-setting to the algorithm.3Orca Information. Antitrust Lawsuit Accuses 18 Property Management Companies and Yardi Systems of Rent Price-Fixing
The data landlords hand over, according to the complaint, includes effective rents, lease terms, current and projected vacancies, and concessions — the kind of information competitors would normally guard closely. By pooling it through Yardi’s software, the suit says, landlords reached “supracompetitive” rents without having to talk to each other directly.4Competition Bureau Canada. Competition Bureau Position Statement Regarding Its Civil Investigation Into RealPage’s and Yardi’s Use of Algorithmic Pricing Software The complaint also alleges that landlords conducted direct market surveys with competitors to share pricing.5Multifamily Dive. Yardi Rent Pricing Antitrust Case Narrowed in Washington
One quote surfaced during the litigation captures the plaintiffs’ theory. A property manager using RENTmaximizer reportedly said in 2016, “We simply wouldn’t have raised rents that much or that quickly on our own.”3Orca Information. Antitrust Lawsuit Accuses 18 Property Management Companies and Yardi Systems of Rent Price-Fixing
The class covers anyone in the United States who leased multifamily housing from a landlord using Yardi’s RENTmaximizer or Revenue IQ software any time since September 8, 2019.1Hagens Berman. Yardi Rent Price-Fixing Antitrust Nationwide Yardi was sued alongside 18 property management companies, including JLL, Morguard, Bridge Property Management, Legacy Partners, Towne Properties, and Tribridge Residential.
How Yardi Is Defending Itself
Yardi denies wrongdoing. The company says Revenue IQ does not use one client’s confidential pricing data to generate recommendations for another. Instead, Yardi says the software relies on each client’s own property-specific data and publicly available housing market information, and that landlords keep full discretion over whether to accept or reject the software’s suggestions.5Multifamily Dive. Yardi Rent Pricing Antitrust Case Narrowed in Washington In a public statement responding to the litigation, Yardi said “there is nothing illegal about revenue management.”6Stateline. State AGs Ramp Up Scrutiny of Alleged Price-Fixing in Rental Housing
Where the Federal Case Stands
Motion to Dismiss Denied
On December 4, 2024, Judge Lasnik denied the defendants’ motion to dismiss. He found the plaintiffs had adequately alleged both an “invitation and acceptance” of a price-fixing arrangement and enough circumstantial evidence to make a conspiracy plausible.7Hogan Lovells. Federal Judge in Washington Applies Per Se Treatment for Algorithmic Price-Fixing Claims It would be irrational, the judge reasoned, for landlords to raise prices while ignoring occupancy rates unless they had a “prior understanding that competitors would likewise raise rates.”8Holland & Knight. Latest Collusion by Algorithm Ruling Offers More of Same
More consequentially, Judge Lasnik applied the “per se” standard to the price-fixing claims. Under that standard, the alleged conduct is treated as inherently anticompetitive, and plaintiffs do not need to prove actual harm to the market — only that the agreement existed. Rejecting the argument that algorithmic tools are too novel for per se treatment, the judge wrote that “the machinery employed by a combination for price-fixing is immaterial” and “as technology has evolved, so too have methods of price fixing.”7Hogan Lovells. Federal Judge in Washington Applies Per Se Treatment for Algorithmic Price-Fixing Claims That set the Yardi case apart from the parallel RealPage litigation in Tennessee, where the court applied the more lenient rule-of-reason standard.9Hogan Lovells. Recent Developments in Algorithmic Pricing: US Appeals Court Weighs In
DOJ and FTC Backed the Plaintiffs
In March 2024, ahead of the motion to dismiss ruling, the Department of Justice and Federal Trade Commission filed a joint Statement of Interest urging the court to treat the alleged conduct as per se illegal. The agencies argued it is per se unlawful for competing landlords to jointly delegate pricing to a common algorithm, regardless of whether they can override individual recommendations, and noted that “unsuccessful price-fixing agreements also are per se illegal.”10U.S. Department of Justice. Statement of Interest in Duffy v. Yardi Systems, Inc. The DOJ has not filed its own enforcement action against Yardi; its involvement is limited to that statement.6Stateline. State AGs Ramp Up Scrutiny of Alleged Price-Fixing in Rental Housing
Ten Defendants Dismissed for Jurisdictional Reasons
On March 30, 2026, Judge Lasnik dismissed 10 out-of-state property management companies from the case for lack of personal jurisdiction, ruling they had not taken “intentional actions expressly aimed at” Washington state. The dismissed companies included Banyan Living Ohio, Envolve Communities, Grubb Properties, The Habitat Company, LumaCorp, McWhinney Property Management, Singh Management, Towne Properties Asset Management, Walton Communities, and Woodward Management Partners. Yardi and defendants with Washington ties remain in the case.5Multifamily Dive. Yardi Rent Pricing Antitrust Case Narrowed in Washington
First Settlement: FPI Management, $2.8 Million
FPI Management Inc. became the first defendant to settle, agreeing to pay $2.8 million into a class fund. Judge Lasnik granted preliminary approval on October 23, 2025. No other defendants have publicly announced settlements as of mid-2026.1Hagens Berman. Yardi Rent Price-Fixing Antitrust Nationwide
Where Things Sit in Mid-2026
The case is deep in discovery and expert battles. The parties are fighting over expert reports, including work by economist Ioana Marinescu; Yardi has moved to strike her second report and sought fees under the federal discovery rules. Motions to seal expert-related materials have also been filed.2PACER Monitor. Duffy v. Yardi Systems Inc. Et Al. In February 2026, Yardi opposed the plaintiffs’ request for additional discovery, saying they had not identified specific materials they still needed.11Law360. Yardi Urges No More Discovery in Wash. Rent-Fixing Suit No trial date or class certification deadline has been set publicly.
The California Case Yardi Won
A separate renter class action filed in February 2024 in Alameda County Superior Court, Mach v. Yardi Systems, Inc. (Case No. 24-CV-063117), made similar allegations under California’s Cartwright Act. On October 6, 2025, Judge Michael M. Markman granted Yardi summary judgment and dismissed the case with prejudice.12ALM. Mach v. Yardi Systems Inc., Judgment
The ruling turned on something concrete. Yardi produced the actual source code of Revenue IQ during discovery, and the court found it showed the software does not use one client’s confidential data to generate pricing for another client. The court also rejected the theory that multiple landlords independently choosing the same software constituted an agreement, citing the Ninth Circuit’s decision in Gibson v. Cendyn Group, which held that “adopting a common software application itself is not an antitrust violation.”13Inside Class Actions. California Court Rejects First Algorithmic Price-Fixing Case to Reach Summary Judgment It was the first algorithmic pricing antitrust case to reach summary judgment, and Yardi publicly framed it as vindication of the software’s design.14Yardi Systems. Yardi Statement About the Mach v. Yardi Et Al. MSJ Win
Whether the California outcome dictates the result in Seattle is an open question. The federal plaintiffs allege additional conduct beyond the software’s architecture, including the market surveys and a broader pattern of data exchange among landlords.
How Gibson and RealPage Shape What Comes Next
The Ninth Circuit’s August 2025 decision in Gibson v. Cendyn Group (No. 24-3576) is the first federal appeals ruling on algorithmic pricing and antitrust. It involved hotel revenue software, but the logic reaches Yardi. The court held that competitors independently licensing the same pricing software does not violate the Sherman Act, so long as each competitor’s confidential data stays “siloed” and the competitors have not agreed among themselves to follow the recommendations. The panel added that it would “undoubtedly” violate antitrust law for competing businesses to agree to abide by a third party’s pricing recommendations.15United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. Gibson v. Cendyn Group, LLC16Axinn Veltrop. First Appellate Ruling on Algorithmic Pricing: What the Ninth Circuit Said
Yardi’s California win aligned with Gibson: siloed data and no proof of an agreement among landlords. The Washington case pushes on the other side of the line the Ninth Circuit drew, alleging that landlords exchanged competitively sensitive information through market surveys and collectively entrusted Yardi with the data to coordinate prices.
The Yardi litigation runs parallel to a much larger set of cases against RealPage, a competing software provider. The DOJ sued RealPage and reached a consent decree in November 2025 requiring the company to stop using competitors’ nonpublic data in recommendations, halt market surveys, remove features that limit price decreases, and accept an independent monitor for at least three years. The settlement included no financial penalties and no admission of wrongdoing.17U.S. Department of Justice. Justice Department Requires RealPage to End Sharing Competitively Sensitive Information5Multifamily Dive. Yardi Rent Pricing Antitrust Case Narrowed in Washington No state attorneys general have filed separate suits against Yardi specifically.6Stateline. State AGs Ramp Up Scrutiny of Alleged Price-Fixing in Rental Housing
A Note on Yardi Employee Wage Settlements
If you have seen references to a Yardi settlement and are trying to figure out whether it is the rent case, note that Yardi has also resolved two employment class actions in California state court. These are wage-and-hour claims by Yardi’s own employees and have nothing to do with the rent-fixing allegations. Firth v. Yardi Systems Inc. (Case No. 23CV03558) settled for $950,000, covering exempt software employees in California paid below certain salary thresholds between August 2019 and December 2023, with about $6,360 going on average to each of 82 class members after final approval in November 2025.18Santa Barbara Superior Court. Tyler Firth vs. Yardi Systems Inc., Tentative Ruling A second case, Hood v. Yardi Systems, Inc. (Case No. 56-2021-00557901-CU-OE-VTA), also settled; awards were disbursed on December 19, 2025, with checks valid through June 18, 2026.19Apex Class Action. Yardi Systems Settlement Renters are not eligible for either fund.