July 19, 2024

Brown Introduces Bill to Create Antitrust Review Process & Crack Down on Corporate Investors in The Housing Market

Bill Would Require Private Equity and Other Corporate Investors to Report Transactions to the FTC and Justice Department When They Buy Up Homes

WASHINGTON, D.C. – U.S. Senator Sherrod Brown (D-OH), Chairman of the Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee, introduced legislation to increase competition in the housing market by requiring corporations and private equity firms that buy up large numbers of houses and apartments to report those transactions to antitrust enforcers. The Housing Acquisitions Review and Transparency (HART) Act would make it easier to stop anticompetitive transactions that could increase housing costs, decrease services, and push homebuyers out of the market. Currently, even the largest transactions of residential property do not need to be reported to the Federal Trade Commission and Justice Department for antitrust review.

“In too many communities in Ohio, big private equity investors buy up homes, raising local housing prices and raking in profits by jacking up the rent while hiding behind opaque holding companies,” said Brown. “Our bill will make it easier to crack down on this anticompetitive behavior, and help place a check on private equity and other corporate landlords.”

Brown introduced the legislation alongside Senator Amy Klobuchar (D-MN), Chairwoman of the Judiciary Subcommittee on Antitrust, Competition Policy and Consumer Rights, along with cosponsors Senators Mazie Hirono (D-HI), Jeff Merkley (D-OR), Bernie Sanders (I-VT), Tina Smith (D-MN), Chris Van Hollen (D-MD), Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), and Senator Wyden (D-OR).

As Chair of the Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee, Brown has been a leader in working to crack down on Wall Street and big private equity investors that buy up homes and drive up housing costs. In July 2023, Brown introduced the Stop Predatory Investing Act to restrict tax breaks for big corporate investors that buy up homes, often driving up local housing prices and rents. 

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