The legislation, known as the Homes for American Families Act, would amend the landmark Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890 to make it illegal for investment funds with over $150 million in assets to buy single-family homes, condominiums or townhouses. It doesn’t apply to homebuilders that are constructing units for sale.
Currently, large corporate landlords are willing to let housing units sit empty vs letting market rates drop. A company with 500 units makes the same amount leasing 400 units at $1500/mo as they would leasing 470 units at $1300/mo and they have less overhead. The realpage software lets them coordinate with all the other corporate landlords without direct communication.
The reason I think this policy would help renters is by making vacant units significantly more expensive and pushing corporate property managers to actually compete rather than sit on vacancies.