Pitt students can now rate and review Oakland landlords using the newly developed website, Rate Yinz Landlord.
The site, which launched in January of this year, was created by the Renters First Ad Hoc Committee, a Pitt Student Government Board task force, following numerous complaints from students over the years regarding unsafe living conditions in Oakland. Rate Yinz is meant to act as a space for students to share their experiences with Oakland landlords — both good and bad.
Emilia Morris, Renters First’s previous co-chair and recent Pitt graduate, said the team was inspired to create Rate Yinz last semester after noticing that students had no centralized source of information about Oakland’s landlords and realty companies.
“Many students face fear of eviction,” Morris said. “We wanted there to be a spotlight on the landlords doing that, and also a spotlight on good landlords who have great practices in Oakland.”
Over the summer, Morris conducted research about students’ experiences renting in Oakland, which she said revealed that student’s reluctance to discuss their negative encounters stemmed from a fear of appearing ungrateful compared to other students they felt “had it worse.” She wants students to recognize their issues and feel comfortable speaking about them.
“I had people with roach infestations and mold and roofs falling say, ‘Well, I didn’t have it as bad as other people,’” Morris said.
Rate Yinz is modeled after Rate My Professor, a popular website students can use to assess educators at their respective universities. Joshua Small, web developer for Rate Yinz and junior political science and urban planning major, said the group chose the RMP model for its popularity with students, as well as its practical navigation system.
“We thought, ‘How do we make this more intuitive?’” Small said. “And that’s where Rate My Professor came from.”
Similar to RMP, users can post anonymously on Rate Yinz, but they will be labeled as a verified student if they use their student email. Maryn Dubay, the current chair of Renter’s First, said the committee chose to make users anonymous for fear that students could be targeted by landlords if their names are public.
One business rated on the site is Lobos Management, a property management company with a number of rental properties in Oakland. Noah Smith, Lobos Management’s operations and technology manager, said the company finds anonymous submissions impractical because it makes it difficult to understand an issue a resident may have at their property.
“In our experience, feedback is most useful when it’s tied to a real interaction because then we can actually address it,” Smith said.
Dubay said although she understands a lack of credibility could be an issue, the site’s main purpose is to start a conversation, not to resolve conflicts between individual tenants and their landlords.
Small contrasted Rate Yinz with College Pads, a housing service that helps Pitt students find local apartments and roommates. He said College Pads has a “pay-to-play” system where property managers can pay a fee to be featured on the site.
Rate Yinz, in comparison, will be a “neutral” service, according to Morris.
“We care about the stories, and we’re not in it for anybody else’s interests,” Morris said.
For now, Renter’s First plans on keeping the website in-house, as they want to retain their mantra of “for students, by students,” according to Sarahbeth White, co-chair of Renter’s First and senior urban planning major. However, Dubay said should the website increase in popularity, they are willing to outsource administrative tasks to a third party.
They are also recruiting first-years and sophomores in the committee to run the website once its current developers graduate, according to Dubay.
“We’ve integrated them into the process of launching the website, working on the website, the [administrative] pieces of it, so that the knowledge of how to keep it going extends beyond us,” Dubay said.
Members of Renters First also hope that the site will signal to landlords that they “can’t get away with everything,” according to Dubay. They see Rate Yinz as a launching pad for further education and regulation on tenant rights.
Small said he would like Rate Yinz to expose the issues with off-campus housing in Oakland and fix potential transparency issues between landlords and tenants.
“Knowledge is power, and right now, students are powerless,” Small said.