Apartment List: Apt rentals

Apartment List Review: Quick Matches, Over-Budget Picks and Shared Contacts

Free Because Landlords Pay Per Lease: The Quiz and the Short List

Renters pay nothing, with no in-app purchases on Google Play, because properties send monthly move-in reports and pay a fee whenever a lease traces back to a lead from the platform, a model the partner FAQ calls pay per lease. Setup is a quiz on bedrooms, budget, commute destination and amenity tiles such as Gym, Pool, Laundry and Parking, and the privacy policy lists income range and eviction history among the details users may provide. Listings then arrive one card at a time to sort into Short List, Maybe or Not For Me, and the service is limited to US users aged 18 and older.

Perfect, Flex and 'Pay a Bit More': Why Matches Exceed Your Budget

Results are grouped rather than filtered. Perfect Matches are meant to hit every wishlist item, Smart matches balance price, location and features, and Flex Matches relax some criteria using local data. A partner FAQ adds a 'Pay a bit more' category so pricier communities still reach renters who set a low budget, citing company research that 60% of renters who enter a target rent end up leasing for more, $180 above it on average. In June 2026 the developer told a reviewer it intentionally shows a range slightly above budget. Of the 150 newest English reviews on Google Play, posted March to September 2026, 17 complain of matches $100 to $800 over their limit.

What a Like, a Virtual Tour or Repeat Visits Send to Landlords

The privacy policy, last updated April 21, 2025, names the triggers: requesting a tour, watching a virtual tour, clicking through to a property site, liking a listing, marking it 'love is in the air' or returning to the same page several times all pass your contact details to that property's manager. Partner documents say the lead also carries your wishlist and preferred tour times. Contacting a property counts as consent to its calls and texts, including autodialed, prerecorded or artificial-voice ones, even if your number is on a do-not-call list. These disclosures can be switched off on the data-privacy-preferences page, but calls already under way stop only property by property. Reviewers in August and September 2026 said properties reached them after they declined the automatic inquiry prompt.

Rent Specials Yes, Cash Back No: Sunny, Lea and Paid Placement

Signing a lease through this app earns renters nothing beyond filters for rent specials and price-drop alerts; cash back lives in Sunny, a separate app the company launched in beta on June 9, 2026, paying up to $500 on qualifying leases from what it describes as the property's commission; amounts vary by listing and can change. Replies to your inquiries may come from Lea, the company's AI leasing assistant, which texts, emails and calls on behalf of properties. Properties can also buy higher placement through flexible pricing options, formerly called LIFT. Apple's privacy label lists contact info and identifiers as data that may be used to track you, and the App Store listing notes advertising.