The Landlord Lens - DIY vs Corporate Landlords: Who Actually Treats Renters Better?

Episode Date: August 8, 2025

Think corporate landlords give you better service? Think again.In this video, we break down the real differences between DIY landlords and corporate giants. Rent hikes, fees, maintenance, and how they actually treat their tenants. The answer to “Who’s better for renters?” might shock you.Whether you’re a renter, landlord, or just curious about the housing market, this is a must-watch.#DIYLandlord #CorporateLandlord #RentingTips

48% of renters that rented from a corporate landlord experienced three plus increases in rent in just three-year period. So that means half of renters in a corporate landlord setting experience rent hikes at least every year. Face value, you think you're renting a place for $2,000 a month. Turns out when you add it all up, that's $2,500 a month. Hey, everybody. Welcome to another episode of The Landlord Lens. I am joined, as usual, by our co-host, Seamus Nally. Seamus, how are you doing this fine summer day?

John, I'm doing awesome. What are we talking about today? We're talking about two types of landlords, the DIY landlords who own and operate, you know, one to 15, one to 50 units typically in their local area and manage it themselves, right? And the corporate landlords who own and operate thousands of units, sometimes across markets from skyscrapers in New York or L.A. Yeah, and I really like the way you put it earlier where you said thousands of families just under one thumb. That's right. So as we jump in and start to contrast the differences between these groups, I think it's super important to start with how their incentives are different.

So what's really interesting with corporate landlords is in the residential space, typically they're buying to hold for about seven years. Only seven. Exactly, yeah. So what that means is they're coming in, they're making, they're thinking about everything on a timeline of about seven years. As a result, they're way more likely to raise rent. Yep. Right. We have a juicy stat here with 48% of renters that rented from a corporate landlord experienced three plus increases in rent in just three year period. So that means half of renters in a corporate landlord setting experience rent hikes at least every year.

Yes, exactly. And that's part of the incentive structure of only that seven year hold, right? We have to abstract every single bit of value we can from that asset. The other thing is actually on the finishes, right, and the quality of that property. when I bought my primary and when I purchased rental properties, I'm not just thinking about holding them for seven years, then flipping them to someone else, right? As a result, and this is something I tell all other burr landlords to do, put in finishes that are going to last you, right?

So you are not consistently revisiting and having the same maintenance requests over and over again. So I'm thinking on a 20-year horizon. Right. In 20 years, most corporate landlords may have turned over that property three, maybe even four times in the same 20 years that I'm thinking about holding as a DIY landlord. You know, this makes me think of a conversation I had with my dad before buying my first primary,

and he said, don't buy it. It was flipped. And I wish I had listened to him. Well, it's kind of like the rental car, right? It's like buy it, beat the living crap out of it and then sell it a couple of years down the road. And I think that is a huge different incentive. And when you look through that lens, you understand why corporate landlords act the way they do and why DIY landlords often act the way they do.

Makes a lot of sense to me. In one case, the renter is somebody whose face you know, right? The DIY, it's a human relationship. In the other case, you're an input to the value of the asset you want to flip in seven years. Exactly. I really like the analogy of your local coffee shop versus buying coffee through Amazon, right? You're a customer of coffee in both situations, but you walk into your local coffee shop. You're going to see a familiar face.

They may know your name. They may even know your order, right? Yeah. No one at Amazon, no matter how much Amazon my wife purchases, knows my name, right, or knows our regular order. And it is a big difference. And DIY landlords can lean into that, right? Lean into the human aspect of it and building that relationship with your customer, which in this case is your tenant. Yep.

Because you know they're not going to get that from a corporate landlord standpoint. That's right. I've never met Jeffrey Bezos. I'm sorry to hear that. Fantastic guy. Fantastic guy. Another example of this is just how corporate landlords handle fees, specifically the hidden fees. versus DIY landlord.

So 23% of corporate tenants report having hidden fees versus only 7% of DIY landlords. And why is that? Well, there's a lot of laws and legislation around what you can charge for deposit, what you can charge for pet rent and different things like that. And so what will happen is corporate landlords will bundle a lot of things.

They'll call them a fee, an administrative fee. It's a popular one. And it will be hidden as in, At face value, you think you're renting a place for $2,000 a month. Turns out when you add it all up, that's $2,500 a month. Wow. One thing that's kind of interesting here is, as I'm listening to you, is I'm thinking of the DIY landlords that have been reacting last seven years

to all of this anti-landlord legislation, all this anti-landlord stuff. Because to them, they're just like, hey, I've got three tenants and three units. I raise the rent 2% every year. I'm prompt with maintenance requests. I know all their names. What's all this hate about? And it's actually, this is why. This is why it's because all these tenants have these kinds of landlords that they're dealing with all the time.

Yeah. And unfortunately, the more legislation, right, that comes in for landlords in general, the harder it is for DIY landlords. Because if we go back to how you position corporate landlords and I think you said high rises in New York or skyscrapers in New York, what's sitting next to them in that skyscraper are lawyers. And so they can actually handle the changing legislative environment. a lot easier than DIY landlords. So which is interesting is they create the problem. Legislation comes in. They can actually deal with a problem a lot better than all of our DIY landlords out there.

Which, yeah. I mean, that's unfair for the DIY landlords. There's another way in which those lawyers make it easy for them to be unfair to the renter, and that's evictions. Corporate landlords are much more likely, so 68% more likely to move forward with an eviction than DIY landlords. that's for a couple of reasons. One, it goes back to the humanity aspect of things, right?

You're just another number to corporate landlords, but it's also because they actually have the teams behind them to process evictions quickly. Yep. And so they can push forward with those in ways that DIY landlords really struggle or at times don't even have the means to move forward. Yeah, if I'm imagining myself as the person thinking about evicting or not, if I can just say, yes, eviction and hand that problem off to a lawyer I employ,

I'm much more likely to do that than if I need to show up at court and I need to file everything and I need to go to the lawyer meetings and everything like that. Absolutely. I mean, why would you work with a tenant for a payment plan, right? Or even cash for keys or one of those situations when you have someone else, you know, behind the scenes that you can make it their problem and then they go to work. Something as I step back from all these conversations we're having about the different incentives and how they act in the market differently, it seems pretty clear that an ideal housing market has way more DIY to stabilize it. and maintain predictability versus these kind of volatile, lots of change type actions that come

from the corporate landlord side that take advantage of the renter market. Is that a fair characterization? In general, it is much better for communities to be made up of primary homeowners, right? As well as DIY landlords when compared to a lot of the corporate landlords. This is one of the reasons that build to rent draws a lot of skepticism. And I think rightfully so to some extent is because, These are corporate landlords out there that are building a whole bunch of inventory. Their plan is to hold it for a short period of time, right?

That's seven years. And then they're going to flip it to the next guy. We talked to all about this, talked about how it might impact the housing market, what their incentives are different. Now, I'm a tenant and I'm going out to rent a new place, maybe in a new city I'm moving to. I'm full of hope. I got a new job. I'm looking at all the rental listings. What's your message to me?

Yeah, I think if you're one of the tenants out there watching, which I'm guessing we don't have a ton of. But it's to really think about who owns and manages this property that you are about to rent. And ask questions. Ask questions like, when's the last time you raised rent, right? How often do you raise rent? What is your rent increased philosophy, right? And if you're a DIY landlord out there, be ready to answer that question because you know the leasing agent down the road at the corporate landlord leasing office is ready to answer that question. but that's a really important one.

How quickly do you get turnaround maintenance requests on average? Who's your team that does that? Are all good questions to ask when you're going to rent. Awesome. And for the DIY landlords, what would you tell them in this moment? Position yourself as a local coffee shop. Yeah. Be human.

Think of your customer who is your tenant, right, as someone you want to build a professional relationship with. I'm not saying take them out fishing. But you do have. value in this market by being human. Okay. And then to the corporate landlords hate watching right now. Well, please like and subscribe to our video. You can even leave a comment if you think we're full of it.

But maybe just chill out. Take the next 10 years off of purchasing. I think that would be great for all of us. I think you're right. Awesome. Thanks everybody for watching Landlord Lens. Like and subscribe to get more content like this. And we will see you on the next video.

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