1. MAPC Rental Listings Consortium
Inner Core Committee
May 15, 2019 Meeting
Jessie Partridge Guerrero
Research Manager

2. Objective: form a consortium to support rental listings database maintenance and improvements

3. Background: why do we need a rental listings database?

4. Greater Boston Rents are Among the Highest in the Nation
MEDIAN RENT, 2-BEDROOM APARTMENT, SEPTEMBER 2017
Source: Zumper.com

5. Existing Sources of Rent Data are Insufficient
American Community Survey
Rent average for long-term and new residents
Data is aggregated to 5-year intervals and has time lag
Data only available aggregated to Census geographies
Private sources
Opaque about their methods of collection
To get record-level rental listings is expensive and often cost prohibitive
Bias in sources of rental unit information

6. Timeline 2013-14: First use of Padmapper data for research report
2015: Technology and capacity to scrape rental listings from online platforms
2017: Development project with municipal partners to clean and improve collected data
2018: Quarterly data reports to municipal partners
2019: Rental Listings Consortium recruiting and Phase 2 work
Figure source: Dimensions of Displacement, MAPC, 2014

7. Pressing Research Questions
How many units are naturally affordable?
Where are rents going up?
What is the effect of amenities on rent?
How does development impact rent?

8. Methods: Collecting, Cleaning, and categorizing

9. Automated Data Processing Steps
Scrape data from online sources
Clean, deduplicate, assess, and annotate
Geolocate to parcels
Report summary information quarterly

12. Limitations Bias in data sources Geocoding constraints
Vast online rental ecosystem
API Instability
Gaps in data colleciton

13. Findings: Price Distributions and Affordability

14. Asking Price Distributions
2017 Q4 asking price distributions by bedroom count
Data inputs
Parcels
Zoning
Station areas
Growth areas
MassBuilds developments
Constraints
Protected open space
Flood plains and wetlands
New buildings
Already dense areas
Assumptions
FAR
Area per unit
Minimum lot size
Residential share of floor area

15. Affordability What share of units are affordable?
6.8% meet Fair Market Rent
(0 to 4 bedroom units)
Affordable to Low Income household of 4 (2 or more bedrooms):
0.3% Extremely Low (30% AMI)
1.7% Very Low (50% AMI)
14.4% Low Income (80% AMI)

16. Affordability Over Time
Share of units at or below fair market rent up slightly overall; down slightly for 0-bedroom units
DRAFT RESULTS, DO NOT CIITE

17. Affordability Over Time
Slight increase for Low-Income household of 4 since 2015, otherwise very little change
DRAFT RESULTS, DO NOT CIITE

18. Consortium Framework

19. Membership Benefits First access to quarterly data including:
Record-level listing data for your municipality
Summary statistics at the municipality and neighborhood level, by bedroom count and age of unit
Shapefile of all listings in your municipality
Decision-making input
The consortium will work with MAPC to decide how annual funds are invested, whether in making improvements to the database, adding new features, or purchasing additional data

20. Proposed Consortium Scope of Work
Core deliverables and activities ($25,000)
Quarterly consortium meetings
Quarterly data reporting to consortium members
Digital infrastructure maintenance and improvements
Optional features and activities for consideration ($5,000 to $22,000)
Produce digital interface for data reporting
Collect rental listings data from additional data sources
Improvements to geocoding process

21. Proposed Membership Fee Structure
Population Threshold
Annual Membership Cost
150,000 or more
$6,000
70,000 to 149,999
$4,000
40,000 to 69,999
$2,000
Under 40,000
$1,000

22. Inner Core Committee Municipal Fees
Municipality
Population 2010
Proposed Fee
Arlington
42,844
$ 2,000
Belmont
24,729
$ 1,000
Boston
617,594
$ 6,000
Brookline
58,732
Cambridge
105,162
$ 4,000
Chelsea
35,177
Everett
41,667
Lynn
90,329
Malden
59,450
Medford
56,173
Melrose
26,983
Milton
27,003
Newton
85,146
Quincy
92,271
Revere
51,755
Saugus
26,628
Somerville
75,754
Waltham
60,632
Watertown
31,915
Winthrop
17,497

23. Discussion

24. Contact: Jessie Partridge Guerrero Research Manager jpartridge@mapc
Contact: Jessie Partridge Guerrero Research Manager