#620 Online: Landlord Mapper - The National Landlord Database Initiative

Dylan Pederson is a former tenant organizer and founder and lead developer of the Landlord Mapper, a national landlord database initiative. He has developed a novel methodology for obtaining landlord datasets using property taxpayer records and has created a web application allowing users to investigate landlords and their properties. His work aims to help tenants research their landlords, and to promote broader transparency in rental markets.

Landlords wield immense power over the tenant class and over American society at large. Much of that power comes from their ability to operate in secrecy, hidden from public scrutiny behind shell companies and trusts. Landlords often don’t even provide tenants with their names, leaving tenants in the dark as to who they’re renting from.

This extreme asymmetry of information between tenants and landlords is unacceptable, as it serves to further marginalize the tenant class. Landlord Mapper seeks to level the playing field between landlords and tenants by bringing landlords and into the spotlight.

ASL This event will not have an American Sign Language interpreter.