On Monday, Cutlers Property Management launched a ‘tender campaign’ of “arguably the most notorious flat on campus,” the ‘Debacle’, on their student Facebook page. This means that instead of students applying for a flat at a fixed price, students must send them their “best offer”. The highest offer, and best ‘quality’ of applicant, will succeed.
The campaign was met with immediate backlash, with students on the post, and in messages to Critic directly, calling this campaign “exploitation”. One student told Critic that by “creating a bidding war amongst students who are already strapped for cash” and by “putting [one of the strongest brands in North Dunedin for student culture] down to a price, you are destroying that culture".
Matt Cutler, Managing Director and Sales at Cutlers, told Critic that it was “a fallacy that landlords determine the market when in fact the tenants do”.
According to Cutler, this particular flat receives multiple applications yearly, many by first-time flatters, and it can be difficult to choose the right group.
In the past Cutlers have tried running competitions “for a bit of fun … to decide which group gets a flat”, but by doing so “received complaints”. One of these competitions included a stunt in 2017 where male students jumped into the Leith, which was filmed and uploaded to Cutler’s student Facebook page. This stunt prompted the University to tell them to take it down due to safety concerns of “the mostly shallow and rocky nature of the river around the Campus area”. Cutler was the first to point out that they did not take it down.
He said that when these competitions are unavailable to help decide on the best candidates, “price becomes the next option”.
“We could have advertised with a price and received multiple applications meaning we end up getting groups to offer their best price anyway. By doing it this way we just speed up that process and make it transparent from the start.”
When postgraduate student and veteran of the Dunedin renters market, Matthew, was given this explanation, he said if this was “them being super honest, [it] means they are cocky enough to know they can get away with it”.
In a statement to Critic, student union OUSA “strongly condemns auctioning (or ‘tendering’) rental prices, particularly when it seems to be leveraging ‘well-known flats’ and so early in the year”. OUSA is also “concerned about the precedent this sets. This is not normal and it shouldn’t be. We encourage our students, not just in this case but in all renting situations, to hold off on signing flats and reaching out to our Student Support team for more information.”
Jack Manning, Colleges Officer at OUSA, added that this kind of campaign was “particularly worrying for College residents who are new to the renting market – it’s their first time flatting so they can’t be expected to know this might be too much or it’s too soon to sign a flat".
A University spokeswoman told Critic, “With regards to this latest promotional event, the University reiterates that it is important that landlords at all times try to remain ethical and lawful when advertising accommodation to students.”
Tendering offers in this way on rental properties, while unpopular, is not unlawful.
Cutler said “Given the backlash we won’t be advertising in this way again but in all honesty this will still continue to happen in situations where you have several groups really wanting a particular flat; it just won’t be advertised”.