Hello HN, and thank you for the kind comments! I'm one of the founders of RentHop.com.
To clarify, there are many honest brokers with exclusive no-fee listings, especially in certain neighborhoods such as West Village and Midtown East. If we banned even these brokers, then we would be missing out on a legitimate subset of the available no-fee apartments.
Our current policy is that we will only accept brokers with no-fee exclusives to post on our site (as opposed to a broker with an open listing, which is easy to detect).
In short, the legal landlord gave that broker the exclusive right to be the rental agent and-or property manager. Think of them as mom & pop versions of the big corporate leasing offices; the real landlord specifically does not want to be involved in the leasing process and paid to outsource it.
Don't forget there are plenty of small building owners and managers who don't have the time or capacity to be showing apartments to prospective tenants. Some have even resorted to hiring brokers and paying their fees to get units filled.
Sure there are plenty of unscrupulous brokers out there, but some do provide an invaluable service.
To clarify, there are many honest brokers with exclusive no-fee listings, especially in certain neighborhoods such as West Village and Midtown East. If we banned even these brokers, then we would be missing out on a legitimate subset of the available no-fee apartments.
Our current policy is that we will only accept brokers with no-fee exclusives to post on our site (as opposed to a broker with an open listing, which is easy to detect).
In short, the legal landlord gave that broker the exclusive right to be the rental agent and-or property manager. Think of them as mom & pop versions of the big corporate leasing offices; the real landlord specifically does not want to be involved in the leasing process and paid to outsource it.