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Reviews in multifamily have been around since 2003 but began gaining popularity with prospects and the industry around the turn of the decade. To probably none of your surprises, their relevancy and importance have only increased over the last 15 years and it shows no sign of stopping. The relevancy of certain review sites is ever-changing, but what has not changed is that choosing to lease at (and even tour) an apartment is a commitment for prospective renters. Consequently, they want as much information as possible. Accordingly, prospects have become internet sleuths, approaching reviews dubiously and not taking them at surface level.
We have detailed prospects’ search process and evaluation of online data ad nauseum in our Internet Adventure research that we publish each year (here is the 2025 version). Historically, prospects have formed a perception of the property’s quality by simply analyzing the lifetime star ratings that display on a Google search. Of course, that still plays a significant part in their perception today – they look to see the star rating on Google and then check other ILS’s and review sites’ indexed star ratings to come to a conclusion of how good the property is. But there has been a seismic shift: prospects have become skeptical of the ratings themselves and are now wanting to understand the why.
Spoiler Alert: your star ratings are not the end-all-be-all. The text within your reviews, especially the complaints you are getting, can make or break you.
Introduction
The Big Picture: Gone are the days of prospects blindly trusting your star ratings on Google. If you have any type of negative feedback, prospects (especially younger generations) want to understand why and are willing to move off of leasing at your property based on what they read. They are only touring 3.4 properties on average (down from 5.2 in 2016), so they are looking for every excuse to shorten their efforts.
Why it Matters: Evaluating a property’s online reputation in a way that correlated to bottom-line performance has always been achievable by analyzing lifetime star rating data. However, as the reviews have piled up, it has come with limitations including ILS’s pay-to-play restrictions, sentiment bias by site, and even overly simplistic algorithms for determining star ratings that weight all reviews equally. Consequently, the review space has become messier, liable to potential gamification, and left properties hamstrung by outdated feedback. With J Turner Research’s unique access to categorized text of 13 million reviews across all 150,000 known properties, resident satisfaction can be even more accurately assessed.
Consequently, J Turner Research’s proprietary ORA Score will begin taking into account the text of all properties’ reviews starting in 2026.
Give Me Some Background
J Turner Research’s 2025 Internet Adventure Study detailed that 70% of prospects cared whether residents enjoyed living there, with Millennials and Gen Z placing an even stronger emphasis on it. But the seismic shift is that consumers have become more skeptical. According to Backlinko, 75% of consumers that use reviews are concerned that fake reviews are present. Thus, they inherently are wanting more and more information, especially with big purchases.
This across-the-board skepticism influences how prospects look at reviews in multifamily, and the younger generations are more savvy and distrusting than ever. Rajiv Gopinath, the Chief Solutions Offer at Publicis Media, reported in one his blogs that Gen Z, in particular, “demonstrates what researchers called ‘informed skepticism’ – distrust paired with active verification – at rates 3.7 times higher than previous generations.” They want verification of anything they believe has been potentially influenced by the company selling the product.
While “vibe” can be felt by actively scrolling through properties’ social media pages, truly determining whether residents are happy takes more time. Reading reviews and not just blindly trusting the star rating was a logical shift in prospects’ process to meet their desire for verification.
What are Prospects’ Red Flags?
Our 2025 Internet Adventure Study laid out that certain operational issues were major red flags to prospective renters. But, as we have dived further into understanding their psyche and decision-making process, we have been shocked by how aggressively prospects are willing to move the needle. They are borderline willing to dismiss the star rating completely in some cases!
Our studies with prospects over the spring and summer indicated that across all generations, if a prospect believes you have an issue with any of the following operational areas, they will not lease at or potentially even tour your property (in order of decision-making sway):
- Security
- Pests
- General Cleanliness
- Condition of the Unit
- Financial Clarity
- Communication
- Move-In Quality
- Maintenance Service
- Maintenance Cleanliness
- Packages & Mail
It is important to note that this is not a final check for properties that toe the minimum threshold most prospects will consider your community (3.75), but, rather, something that is being looked at for properties with any rating up to 4.7. It is as if prospects assume the property has inflated their reputation with positive reviews. Unless you have almost completely avoided negative reviews, they want to understand what are dissatisfied renters complaining about. Moreover, it does not take much – if they see approximately 3 reviews verifying an issue like Pests, they believe it really exists.
All that said, avoiding complaints online regarding these red flag operational areas is paramount!
Generational Gaps & Conclusion
Interestingly, Gen Z and Millennials tend to be more forgiving of some operational failures than older generations. Outside of the previously mentioned red flags, other operational failures are likely to only “maybe” affect their decision to tour or lease. Older generations have less patience for any type of operational issue, but don’t seek verification at the same rate younger generations do. In summary:
- All generations of prospective renters care about whether residents are happy
- Younger generations are likely to really dig through your reviews
- Older generations are more sensitive to letting operational issues sway their decision
- All generations will move off your property if they detect underperformance in red flag issues almost entirely regardless of star rating
What Comes Next?
J Turner Research’s ORA Score is going to begin taking into account the text of each property’s reviews starting in 2026. We are incredibly proud of ORA’s correlation to financial performance as verified by RealPage’s assessment that every point of change in ORA can forecast 9.3BPS of premium to market return. However, we don’t rest on our laurels. We always seek to improve that number and certainly feel obligated to adapt to an ever-changing review landscape and prospect decision-making process. We are excited to leverage our database of more than 13 million categorized reviews across all 150,000 known properties to get even closer to accurately assessing how good resident satisfaction is at the property.
The research will not stop with this blog. We have a full-blown research report on how prospects are using the text in reviews coming out in early September. I will continue to detail some of the findings I found interesting in these blogs throughout the fall, giving you as much context to the change as possible.
As always, if you have any questions, please feel free to email me at tbatdorf@jturnerresearch.com or connect with me on LinkedIn.
ABOUT THIS BLOG:
The insights in this blog came from utilizing J Turner Research’s text categorization tool, Einstein. Einstein uses Thought Analysis, a proprietary Ai software, to objectively show you your operational strengths and weaknesses based on anything anyone has ever said about you online in reviews. What is being said is incredibly valuable because it is essentially the "why" behind your scores. Reviews are unprompted descriptions of why a resident is satisfied (left a high star rating) or dissatisfied (left a low star rating). This means that what is being complimented and complained about can be seen by owners and operators as drivers of satisfaction/dissatisfaction.