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A proposed Justice Department judgment would stop Pinnacle from using a revenue management product whose pricing model was trained on nonpublic data other than that of the subject property owner
Most coverage of algorithmic rent cases stops at what a model reads. Paragraph IV.A.1(5) reaches further back, to what the model was trained on.
Bottom line: The proposed final judgment is not entered and binds nobody. Section IV would start running 180 days after entry of the Stipulation and Order, a document this piece did not open, so no calendar date can be given.
Who this affects: Antitrust and in house counsel at property management firms, landlords and REITs, multifamily compliance officers, and the counsel who negotiate revenue management software licences.
Issue date: Filed 4 September 2026 on the ECF stamp. The underlying complaint was filed 7 January 2025.
What changed: A proposed judgment for Pinnacle is on the docket in the RealPage matter, carrying a definition of model training and a restriction that reaches training data.
Analysis: A product could satisfy the runtime data limbs and still fall inside Paragraph IV.A.1(5), because that limb asks what the model was trained on. The judgment defines Runtime Operation as not meaning Model Training.
Primary sources: Proposed Final Judgment, United States v. Pinnacle Property Management Services (Doc 213-1)
- Instrument (EN)
- Proposed Final Judgment, United States v. Pinnacle Property Management Services, LLC
- Authority
- US Department of Justice, Antitrust Division
- Jurisdiction
- United States District Court for the Middle District of North Carolina
- Status
- Proposed and filed. Not entered. The parties have consented to entry; court approval is pending
- Bindingness
- The proposed judgment binds nobody unless and until the court enters it
- Issue date / next deadline
- Filed 4 September 2026. No deadline is running. If entered, Section IV would begin 180 days after entry of the Stipulation and Order
- Document
- Document 213-1, 31 pages, in the docket the judgment identifies as United States et al. v. RealPage et al.
- Primary source
- https://www.justice.gov/atr/media/1460381/dl?inline
The restriction that reaches training data
Paragraph IV.A.1 would stop Pinnacle licensing or using, for any Defendant Property, a revenue management product with any of five characteristics. Defendant Property is a defined term: multifamily rental property Pinnacle services, expressly excluding student housing, affordable housing, age restricted or senior housing, and military housing.
Two of the five limbs are framed around Runtime Operation: using external nonpublic data other than that of the subject property's owner to generate prices, and using one property's nonpublic data to price another owner's property. Two more are not framed that way at all, and cover disclosing nonpublic data to third party managers or owners, subject to exceptions for the owner of the property the data came from and for managers servicing Pinnacle properties, and pooling nonpublic data across properties with different owners.
The fifth is different in kind. It reaches a product that "contains or uses a pricing model or algorithm that has been trained using Nonpublic Data", other than nonpublic data of the property owner of the subject property.
That is a restriction on provenance rather than on operation, and the judgment says so in its own definitions. Section II.P defines Runtime Operation as what a product does while it runs, then adds a sentence that does the work: "Runtime Operation does not mean Model Training." A product could be clean at runtime and still fall inside the fifth limb.
Why the definition of model training carries weight here
Section II.F defines model training as "the process of analyzing data, including by machine learning or regression analysis, to create or adjust the parameters of a model or algorithm to improve the accuracy of the model's or algorithm's predictions".
Regression is expressly named alongside machine learning, so a supplier cannot place a product outside the definition by observing that it does not use machine learning.
The word artificial does not appear in that definition. The test is functional: analysing data to adjust parameters to improve predictive accuracy.
The other restrictions, and the ones with their own clocks
Paragraph IV.A.2 would reach product design directly. It covers a product incorporating a rental price floor or a limit on price decrease recommendations, subject to a carve out where Pinnacle or the owner manually selects it and it is not based on the relevant nonpublic data, and a product that requires Pinnacle to accept recommended prices or gives it financial rewards for accepting them.
Paragraph IV.A.3 would bar agreeing, expressly or tacitly, with an owner or a non-defendant manager to use a particular product, or requiring anyone else to use one. It carves out property specific agreements with an owner or a co-servicing manager, provided the product complies with Paragraphs IV.A.1 and IV.A.2. Paragraph IV.B would give Pinnacle 90 days to bring a newly transferred property into line.
Paragraph IV.C carries two notification duties, not one. Within 180 days after entry Pinnacle would have to notify the United States in writing of its intention to license or use a product, 30 calendar days before using it. For any other revenue management product afterwards, at any Defendant Property, the notice would run 30 calendar days before licensing or using it. Section V adds further restrictions on disclosing and soliciting nonpublic data, and not all of Section V shares Section IV's 180 day start.
Certification, and what would actually bring in a monitor
Under Paragraph IV.E.2 the duty would sit on Pinnacle. If it elected to license or use a product from anyone other than RealPage or a RealPage reseller, it "must secure and submit to the United States a certification from the vendor" that the product complies with Paragraph IV.A or with a RealPage final judgment. The judgment would place no obligation on the vendor itself.
Section VIII.A provides that Pinnacle would not be subject to a monitor if all products it licenses or uses have been "certified pursuant to, or are otherwise compliant with, Paragraph IV.E". Certification is one route; compliance without it is another.
Section VIII.B sets two independent triggers: electing to use a product that is neither certified under nor otherwise compliant with Paragraph IV.E, or a court finding that Pinnacle "has violated any other term of the Final Judgment". Even then a monitor is not automatic. It follows "upon application of the United States, which Defendant may not oppose", with the monitor selected by the United States and approved by the court.
What we did not verify
What we opened: the 31 page proposed final judgment, retrieved from the Justice Department and read as extracted text, including Section II definitions, Sections IV and V, and Section VIII.
What we did not open: the Stipulation and Order that Section IV keys its 180 day clock to, the Competitive Impact Statement, the underlying complaint, any RealPage final judgment the certification route refers to, the Justice Department's press release, and the Willow Bridge judgment. We therefore make no comparison between the two defendants' terms, and we give no calendar date for any step.
What we refuse to claim: we do not say Pinnacle is barred from anything, because the judgment is proposed and not entered, and we do not predict whether or when the court will enter it. We state no comment period, Federal Register date or contact for comments, because the judgment contains none of those. Where we give timing, it is the judgment keying Section IV to entry plus 180 days; the Stipulation and Order that would fix the actual entry date was not examined, so no calendar date follows from it. We do not describe this as a ban on rent setting algorithms. This piece summarises the provisions above and does not cover every limb of Sections IV to VII.
Quotations are reproduced with ASCII punctuation in place of the typographic apostrophes used in the filing, which is a house typesetting convention and not a change to any word.
Informational analysis for working professionals, not legal advice. Confirm how any rule applies to your situation with qualified counsel.
If you license a revenue management product, the diligence question this proposal raises is not only what data the tool reads when it prices a unit. It is what its model was trained on, and whether your supplier can evidence that. Paragraph IV.A.1(5) reaches training data, and Section II.F defines training broadly enough to include regression.
Source File
https://www.justice.gov/atr/media/1460381/dl?inline
Open the proposed final judgment and confirm four things: the 180 day opening clause of Section IV.A, the fifth limb at IV.A.1(5) on models trained using nonpublic data, the model training definition at Section II.F, and the certification duty at Paragraph IV.E.2.
contains or uses a pricing model or algorithm that has been trained using Nonpublic Data. ยท Proposed Final Judgment, Paragraph IV.A.1(5), filed 4 September 2026
FAQ
Is Pinnacle barred from using pricing algorithms?
No. The judgment is proposed and not entered, so it binds nobody, and its Section IV restrictions would begin 180 days after entry of the Stipulation and Order. Even then it would restrict particular products and data uses rather than ban pricing algorithms.
What does it mean that the restriction reaches training data?
Paragraph IV.A.1(5) covers a product containing or using a pricing model or algorithm trained using nonpublic data, other than that of the subject property's owner. A product could comply at runtime and still fall inside that limb.
Does the model training definition only cover AI?
No. Section II.F expressly includes regression analysis alongside machine learning, so a product is not outside the definition merely because it is not machine learning.
Who would have to obtain the certification?
Pinnacle. Paragraph IV.E.2 would require the defendant to secure and submit to the United States a certification from the vendor. The judgment would impose no duty on the vendor.
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