This site (which currently wont connect) was created by some redditors. I understand the sentiment, and the reasoning but I predict it will fail as did previous attempts to create a very similar landlord rating site.
Why? Because unless there is rigid control over who is allowed to input and some verification of that input, there will be an influx of garbage comments that will make the site completely useless. Much like YELP reviews, you can read 'em but do you actually trust what they say? Is the submitter an actual tenant, the landlord, or the landlord's family and friends? Who knows?
Secondly, I think a single lawsuit may bring it down. There have been similar private sites for tenant information that landlords shared among themselves that have been shut down by the privacy commissioner. My understanding is that this site is going to try and anonymize certain data, but Im not sure how its going to hold useful data and anonymize it enough to make a landlord unidentifiable at the same time.
Yes, everyone has a bad landlord story. But every landlord has quite a few bad tenant stories. If this site flies, prepare for the same to be done for tenants.
Why? Because unless there is rigid control over who is allowed to input and some verification of that input, there will be an influx of garbage comments that will make the site completely useless. Much like YELP reviews, you can read 'em but do you actually trust what they say? Is the submitter an actual tenant, the landlord, or the landlord's family and friends? Who knows?
Secondly, I think a single lawsuit may bring it down. There have been similar private sites for tenant information that landlords shared among themselves that have been shut down by the privacy commissioner. My understanding is that this site is going to try and anonymize certain data, but Im not sure how its going to hold useful data and anonymize it enough to make a landlord unidentifiable at the same time.
Yes, everyone has a bad landlord story. But every landlord has quite a few bad tenant stories. If this site flies, prepare for the same to be done for tenants.