Apartments.com is already one of the top consumer websites for multifamily real estate, but the website’s parent company is not comfortable resting on its laurels.
CoStar Group, which owns Apartments.com along with several other prominent online rental platforms, announced recently that it is buying Cozy Services for $68 million and plans to integrate the company’s online rental solutions into its websites.
In addition to Apartments.com, CoStar also owns ApartmentFinder.com, ForRent.com, ApartmentHomeLiving.com, Westside Rentals, AFTER55.com, CorporateHousing.com, ForRentUniversity.com, and Apartamentos.com.
According to CoStar, more than 50,000 landlords already use the Cozy platform for various pieces of the rental process, including property listings, rent estimates, rental applications, tenant screening, and expense tracking.
But one of the biggest features that Cozy offers is the ability to make rent payments online. According to the companies, there are currently more than 120,000 tenants who make online rent payments through the Cozy platform, representing more than $1.4 billion in payments in the last year.
And now, CoStar plans to integrate Cozy’s offerings, including the online rent payment capability, into Apartments.com and its other websites.
“We believe that if we continue to focus on delivering a fantastic renter experience on Apartments.com, we will continue to be the most heavily trafficked website offering the most valued advertising solutions,” Andrew Florance, CoStar Group founder and CEO, said.
“Cozy’s technology makes the renting and payments process simple, secure, and intuitive,” Florance added. “When combined with Apartments.com, the 40 million prospective renters that visit our network each month will be able to effortlessly locate, apply, lease and pay for their new rental home completely online.”
The company expects the integration to create “significant value and efficiency” in the rental process for independent rental owners.
“These owners operate over 22 million rental units in properties that contain five units or less – representing a significant ‘long tail’ opportunity for CoStar,” the company said in a release.
“Based on what property owners are currently willing to pay to fill their properties with a qualified renter, CoStar believes the total addressable market is well over $8 billion,” the company continued.
Additionally, when Cozy is fully integrated into Apartments.com, renters will be able to use the platform to generate a single rental application and credit check for multiple properties.
The company expects this to create a “large population of quality renters for landlords to access for future vacancies.”
The companies expect Cozy’s technology to be integrated into Apartments.com’s platform in the first half of 2019.
“We are excited to be able to bring our landlord and renter services to a larger audience by joining the CoStar team and the Apartments.com network,” Gino Zahnd, Cozy founder and CEO, said. “The combination of CoStar’s leadership in multifamily marketing with our integrated solutions for renters and landlords makes for a very exciting future for all of us.”
