Condo – a dirty word for apartment rental services

A while back we wrote about 2-bedroom, 2-bath units in a full-amenity condo high-rise renting for the same price ($1,950 a month) as a convertible studio directly across the street in a full-amenity rental building.

If you were working with one of Chicago’s parasitical rental services you would not have been offered the choice between the two buildings. The primary reason is simple: the rental service would have had to split the traditional one-month commission 50/50 with the agent who listed the condo for rent, but would receive a full month’s commission from the rental building.

If you’re considering working with a rental service, ask whether they’ll show you MLS-listed homes and condos in addition to managed rental properties. If the answer is “no” or equivocal or “yes” and later proves to be untrue, move on quickly unless you’ve already found your ideal apartment through the rental service.

The flip side of this scenario is that you’ll often find that traditional MLS-oriented agents won’t show renters units in managed rental buildings, but that’s a topic for another day.

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