Westside Rentals Empire Expanding
By Victor - Tuesday February 21st 2006 |
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WestsideRentals.com, the 800 lb. gorilla of Los Angeles area rental listings, is expanding, moving its flagship branch into a snazzy new storefront on Wilshire, next door to Temple Bar and the sadly-recently-deceased Anastasia’s Asylum (more on that TK here).
Curiously, the free information pinata and open market of the internet has not extended to the local rental listing market. Despite the advent of Craigslist (or more likely a result thereof), Westside Rentals has maintained a chokehold on the listings market, ostensibly for their ability to prescreen prospective tenants with their $60 membership fee.
While everyone’s got a right to provide a service and make a buck, Westside Rentals business raises some questions. Craigslist has of late cracked down (somewhat) on agency listings masquerading as individual listings, but who hasn’t been tempted by a link or newspaper blurb of that too-good-to-be-true listing that redirects back to Westside Rentals? Who hasn’t investigated the $450 “studio” in Marina Del Rey that turns out to be a docked houseboat? The “charming” $1000 2br/2ba in Beverlywood that may as well have been airlifted and transplanted from Beirut? The $600 Cheviot Hills “garden guesthouse” that turns out to be a glorified toolshed. Obviously the landlord bears responsibility for the description used–but they aren’t the ones charging you 60 bones. And the kicker is, that once you resign yourself to joining up with WSR, you often notice a slight discrepancy between the promising “guest preview” listings and the actual current listings.
Then there’s those three little letters A-D-J you find in listings (not just those on WSR, admittedly–though they certainly have helped to disseminate its misuse) the elastic application of which has distended its meaning beyond any useful description. I’ve seen West L.A. listings that were just blocks west of Cadillac Ave. In the current vernacular, Brentwood ADJ and Beverly Hills ADJ combined basically encompass a quadrant bounded by PCH, Sunset, Venice and La Brea.
More recently, they’ve started hosting these networking parties at their offices, which promise prospective tenants the opportunity to meet landlords. Anyone been to one of these? I’m curious to know what they’re all about. These sound great for property owners to make sure they are renting to the right kind of people. After all, you can only learn so much from one’s last name and credit report.
But setting these quibbles aside, let’s look at the very nature of rental listing-as-proprietary content. From their Terms of Use:
The purchaser of the information further agrees that the information is proprietary to Westside Rental Connection and that any misuse of the information is a breach of this agreement as well as a violation of California law governing trade secrets
A question for our legal eagles out there: What exactly is the basis for Westside Rentals proprietary claims on their listings? Trade secrets seems to be a curious shield behind which to conduct this business. Would it be some kind of infringement for a member to, say, for instance, copy their listings, to say, the comments section of a popular Los Angeles blog? How would that be different from a member sharing a single listing, verbally, with a friend? How about if a few words in a listing were modified?
We’re just thinking out loud here, folks. That’s all. After all, monopolies need to be able to stand up to scrutiny. Chime in with your views on the Westside Rentals.
EPILOGUE: Better Business Bureau grades WestsideRentals.com a “D”
I am a satisfied customer of westsiderentals.com and i am happy for the decision of registering with them 1 yr back.
Many of my friends got apartment from westsiderentals.com are enjoying the benefits given by them. Its really good company as i haven’t seen any of my friend complaining about it.
Are you kidding me half my school has been ripped of by these telemarketers they say anything to get you to pay..
All my friends had the same experience were sucked in by an advert that they could not see once they paid, and as gor the refund policy even Tom Cruise Mission Impossible could not navigate that requirement.
i am fascinated by the fact that even now, over two years since this was originally posted, the hatred and disdain that many people have come to have for westside rentals still elicits angry postings.
i too have been burned by westside rentals. anyone want to start up an alternative?
My family owns 6 buildings from Silverlake to El Segundo. Almost every landlord I know uses them. Westsiderentals is a good service and they call weekly to see if our vacany is rented.
I want to share my experience with westsiderentals.com , it had been great. Not only i got my apartment in just 2 days after registering with them, also i am getting many services and discounts from their side.
I agree to the fact that westsiderentals.com is expanding really fast. Its just the start for the local company which has a way to long to go. Keep it up!!
Westside sucked me in on an advert as soon as I paid that home was on hold I complained to an employee and I was told they would try and get hold of landlord and put me down as 2nd option and to carry on looking at other properties…
I notice someone else complained here about bait and switch so I asked quite a few customers I met on my route how they came to sign up with Westside Rentals they all said the same thing they called on some adverts as soon as they signed up they could not get that one because it was on hold and were told to look at others..
Face it Westside Rentals you use Bait and Switch tactics and your listings are mainly rented anything left over is either overpriced or been on the list for ever because its junk I canquite safely say I was scammed into signing up.
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Posts #105 through to #107 is Westside hard at work spamming how great they are post #106 and #107 are minutes apart and even use the same wording for westsiderentals.com instead of one just saying Westside Rentals or WSR or Westside …
Hey Westside its not a chat board so if you want to post fake praises to repair the hatred for your company try not to sound like the previous poster to you which was you and try not to be so obvious with your posting time frames which are only minutes apart.
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Makes you wonder why the Department of Real Estate has made your license RESTRICTED..
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I found an decent place through Westsiderentals worth the sixty bucks. But I got ripped off by Capitol for $180.00 in El Monte!!! No website, a hidden office on Garvey. Beaware of Capitol in El Monte ! You will get ripped off for sure.
I am managing a building at 908 4th St. Santa Monica 90403(I reside there) I like Westside Rentals very much. So many rental companies do not even have offices and are fly by night companies. That is why Westsiderentals is on top. Richard McNeil
Westside Rentals has paid for a guy to dance in his seat during the Lakers game. He stands up during timeouts and dances the entire break. He is distracting to anyone who sits nearby but I especially feel for people who sit directly next to him. Just because there’s a stoppage in play doesn’t mean that people don’t need to see what’s taking place on court. Plus he didn’t always take off his big floppy hat when gametime resumed. At least Dancing Barry moved all around the Forum and wasn’t covered in advertising. I guess the Lakers/Staples can’t make any rules completely banning such activities but you think they could do to minimize the disturbance he causes.
very nice :)
Beautiful expression.
Beautiful stuff! That’s not just tagging, that’s art.
Richard McNeil stop spamming fly by night how would you know about something that does not effect you?
Mark Verge WSR copied other companies ideas and simply placed bells and whistles on; underneath everything there is still a lot of rip off shit going one behind WSR doors.
Wow. I was looking around see if I could snag a free WSR password from someone and found this thread. I used them twice before, in 2001 and 2003, and both times found really nice places (expensive but nice) relatively hassle-free. I’m looking to move again, and have had no real luck with craigslist.
I had no idea they even had this reputation. It took longer to find a place the first time, but still only about a week — and not because there was anything shady. Are people really calling about listings and being lied to? I’d love to know before I plonk down $60 in desperation.
Also, the clear BS posts by WSR people? You know you’re losing good customers, right?
I subscribed and paid $60 and didn’t even get to use it since I found a place through friends. I wouldn’t mind getting half my money back, email me at djdurtysanchez gmail …pleas b real and leave a number and some info so I know its legit and not WSR getting back at me
I’ve used westside rentals and did find an apartment. I really hesitated to pay the $60, but there were just too many listings on craigslist, it took too much time to find the ones that I wanted. Since then though, I’ve found a 3rd option, http://hotigloos.com which is free and very easy to search through. Finally!
I grew up in the Palisades so know it pretty well.
WSR put a FAKE listing (ie/ fake address, fake landlord name) on their “guest search” that was too good to be true. I should have known but at this point didn’t know they were liars for hire.
After I paid, the listing was still “avail” but the “landlord” never called me back. I spoke to WSR manager who gave me the address (and some huge story about how she was out of town) whereupon I drove there and found there was NO SUCH HOUSE. I called them back to complain and he never returned my call. This was in 2001.
SCUMMY!!! A friend who knows the founder told me, “oh yeah, Mark’s a big fat liar”.
So put your money down with a healthy grain of salt – some listings are real, some are fake. I can’t believe they are still doing this.
I was going to write letters to local papers but figured it was too exhausting to fight such people.
SAD!
Hence I have no qualms whatsoever trying to get a used password at reduced rate – it’s all fair in the housing search.
Westside Rentals is a total scam! The fictitious ads draw you in and then they hit you with the fees. I have a friend that paid $500 for a guaranteed living space. They were driving around by some fool who didn’t know the city, a total nightmare. the people who wrote good reviews for this place probably work there. You are better off driving to a neighborhood and looking for signs yourself.
I can’t say anything about the fake listings etc, but I’ve used WSR a couple times now and have been generally satisfied. I am by no means rich, but $60 seems like a reasonably small sum to pay to get some extra listings beyond what you can find on Craigslist. Maybe $60 isn’t such a paltry sum for poor college kids, but for every poor college kid looking for a $800 1bd apartment, there’s a 30-something professional with wife and kids looking for a single family home or a condo. Point is, WSR’s business model doesn’t (necessarily) revolve around ripping off 20-year-old college kids. There are those of us for whom $60 is worth the money, even if it only finds a dozen or so listings that you can’t find on Craigslist, or even just for the ability to do an advanced search. When you’re 20 years old, you have gobs of free time, but very little money. When you’re 37 with a wife and kids who works long hours, you have just the opposite.
I’m not saying WSR is perfect. I’m not even saying that they don’t do some shady things with their preview listings, etc. But all the people who have been “burned” or “ripped off” by WSR need to realize that not every customer feels that way. I for one was not lured into shelling out the $60 by looking at the preview listings. I didn’t even bother to look at the preview listings. I paid the $60 because I don’t have the time to scour every single ad on Craigslist searching endlessly for something that’s in the right area, allows pets, has W/D hookups, etc etc, and because so many landlords use WSR that it (potentially) lets me find the right rental a lot quicker. And like I said, I’m not rich but $60 is a relative pittance. Time is my scarcest resource, and the amount of extra time I would have to spend finding and sorting listings on my own (or on Craigslist) is worth way more than $60 to me. I got good results last time I used WSR (found a nearly ideal place in the first week), and so far this time it’s working out well. I’ve been signed up for about a week now and I’m still looking, but so far I’ve been reasonably satisfied with the number and quality of listings I’ve found on WSR.