Comprehensive Rental Information and Housing Services Management System

Location:	California
Posted:	Jan 20, 2026
Due:	Feb 18, 2026
Agency:	City of Berkeley
Type of Government:	State & Local
Category:	W - Lease or Rental of Equipment
Solicitation No:	26-11777-C
Publication URL:	To access bid details, please log in.

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Internal

Finance Department

General Services Division

REQUEST FOR PROPOSALS (RFP)

Specification No. 26-11777-C

FOR

BERKELEY RENT STABILIZATION BOARD COMPREHENSIVE RENTAL INFORMATION AND

HOUSING SERVICES MANAGEMENT SYSTEM

PROPOSALS WILL NOT BE OPENED AND READ PUBLICLY

Dear Proposer:

The City of Berkeley is soliciting written proposals from qualified firms or individuals to implement, operate and

maintain a comprehensive modern data system and CRM solution that links all aspects of Rent Stabilization Board

work including property and unit registration, housing counseling, mediation, petitions and hearings, planning,

finance, data analysis/reports, workflow management and online services. This RFP is not an Invitation to Bid (ITB)

and although price is very important, many other factors will be evaluated to select the most-qualified vendor.

The project scope, content of proposal, and vendor selection process are summarized in the RFP (attached). Proposals

must be received no later than 2:00 pm, on Wednesday, February 18, 2026. Proposals are to be sent via email

with the “Specification No. 26-11777-C and “Comprehensive Rental Information and Housing Services

Management System” clearly indicated in the subject line of the email. Please submit one (1) PDF of the technical

Proposal with the filename saved as, “Proposal: Vendor Name - YY-#####, Berkeley Rent Stabilization Board

Comprehensive Rental Information and Housing Services Management System.” Corresponding pricing

proposal shall be submitted as a separate document with the filename saved as, “Pricing: Vendor Name - YY-#####,

Comprehensive Rental Information and Housing Services Management System.”

Email Proposals to:

City of Berkeley

Finance Department/General Services Division

Solicitations@berkeleyca.gov

Proposals will not be accepted after the date and time stated above. Incomplete proposal or proposals that do not

conform to the requirements specified herein will not be considered. Issuance of the RFP does not obligate the City

to award a contract, nor is the City liable for any costs incurred by the proposer in the preparation and submittal of

proposals for the subject work. The City retains the right to award all or parts of this contract to several bidders, to

not select any bidders, and/or to re-solicit proposals. The act of submitting a proposal is a declaration that the proposer

has read the RFP and understands all the requirements and conditions.

For questions concerning the anticipated work, or scope of the project, please contact Andrew Chang, Principal

Program Manager, via email at achang@berkeleyca.gov no later than Monday, February 2, 2026. Answers to

questions will not be provided by telephone or email. Answers to all questions or any addenda will be posted on the

City of Berkeley’s site at Bid & Proposal Opportunities | City of Berkeley (berkeleyca.gov). It is the vendor’s

responsibility to check this site. For general questions concerning the submittal process, contact purchasing at 510-

981-7320.

We look forward to receiving and reviewing your proposal.

Sincerely,

Henry Oyekanmi

Finance Director

2180 Milvia Street, Berkeley, CA 94704 Tel: 510.981.7320 TDD: 510.981.6903

E-mail: purchasing@berkeleyca.org Website: cityofberkeley.info/finance/

CONTENTS

1. SUMMARY..........................................................................................................................................................1

2. SCHEDULE ........................................................................................................................................................ 1

3. BACKGROUND ..................................................................................................................................................1

4. DRIVERS AND NEEDS......................................................................................................................................2

5. EXPECTED SYSTEM OVERVIEW ................................................................................................................... 4

6. SCOPE OF SERVICES ........................................................................................................................................ 8

7. PROPOSER MINIMUM QUALIFICATIONS ..................................................................................................11

8. SELECTION CRITERIA ...................................................................................................................................12

9. CONTRACT TERMS & REQUIREMENTS.....................................................................................................13

10. SUBMISSION REQUIREMENTS ...............................................................................................................14

11. PAYMENT .................................................................................................................................................... 18

12. CITY REQUIREMENTS ..............................................................................................................................18

13. OTHER REQUIREMENTS ..........................................................................................................................19

14. LIST OF ATTACHMENTS ..........................................................................................................................20

APPENDIX A – HIGH-LEVEL FUNCTIONAL REQUIREMENTS.....................................................................A-1

APPENDIX B – SCOPE OF SERVICES DELIVERABLES ..................................................................................B-1

APPENDIX C – PRIVACY, SECURITY, AND RESILIENCE REQUIREMENTS..............................................C-1

APPENDIX D – GLOSSARY OF KEY TERMS ....................................................................................................D-1

City of Berkeley Rent Stabilization Board

Specification No. 26-11777-C

Page 1 of 20

Comprehensive Rental Information and Housing Services Management System Release Date 01/21/26

1. SUMMARY

The Berkeley Rent Stabilization Board (Rent Board) is soliciting proposals for a Comprehensive Rental

Information and Housing Services Management System that will serve as a centralized, cloud-based platform to

support the agency’s full range of regulatory and public service functions.

To fulfill its mission of promoting housing stability, equity, and transparency, the agency requires a modern,

modular, and user-friendly platform that is highly configurable, modular, and scalable – capable of adapting to

evolving legal requirements, policy changes, and operational workflows.

The new system should integrate core Rent Board functions such as rental property registration, tenancy tracking,

case management and CRM functions, document management, public communication, financial services such as

fee collection and budgetary analysis, and data analytics into a single, user-friendly environment.

The Rent Board seeks a solution that empowers staff to work efficiently and collaboratively to solve problems;

enhances service delivery and transparency to landlords, tenants, and other agency clients; and ensures long-term

sustainability through interoperability, accessibility, flexibility, and performance.

2. SCHEDULE

Items due must be submitted by 5:00 PM Pacific on the due date unless indicated otherwise. All dates are subject

to change; changes to the schedule will be communicated to potential bidders via an addendum to the RFP.

Milestone

Date

RFP Issued to Potential Bidders

January 21, 2026

OPTIONAL Pre-Bid Meeting

January 28, 2026, 9:00am – 10:00 am Pacific

• Zoom Meeting Link:

https://us06web.zoom.us/webinar/register/

WN_zsCpfI6VRweXwO4EtQb4og

• Zoom Webinar ID: 859 1163 6086

• Passcode: 053101

Interested vendors must register in advance using

the Zoom Meeting Link above.

Questions Due from Potential Bidders February 2, 2026

Proposals Due from Bidders

February 18, 2026

Anticipated Award of Contract

April 2026 (TBD)

Anticipated Notice to Proceed to

Selected Vendor

May 2026 (TBD)

3. BACKGROUND

The Rent Board administers one of the most comprehensive rent regulation programs in California. Established

by voter initiative in 1980, the Rent Stabilization and Eviction for Good Cause Ordinance (Ordinance) was

designed to address a persistent housing crisis by protecting tenants from excessive rent increases and arbitrary

evictions, while ensuring fair returns for property owners. The Rent Board plays a critical role in tracking rental

housing trends, limiting residential rent increases, enforcing eviction protections, and supporting low and

moderate-income tenants who would otherwise be priced out of Berkeley’s high-cost housing market.

Today, the Rent Board registers and processes registration fees for over 11,000 rental properties citywide and

provides a suite of services that housing counseling; legal compliance monitoring; public education; landlord-

tenant mediation; and rental housing-related planning and development application review. The Rent Board also

coordinates closely with other City of Berkeley (City) agencies to assist with the implementation of other housing

programs such as Berkeley’s Short-term Rental Ordinance, the Empty Homes Tax, and Fair Chance Ordinance.

City of Berkeley Rent Stabilization Board

Specification No. 26-11777-C

Page 2 of 20

Comprehensive Rental Information and Housing Services Management System Release Date 01/21/26

In 2020, the Rent Board selected a new vendor to replace its legacy system with a cloud-based Software as a

Service (SaaS) platform intended to integrate its former Rent Tracking System and case management system.

The Rent Board’s current Rent Registry launched in 2021 and now serves as the Rent Board’s primary property

database and case management system. The contract with the selected vendor specified a maximum of a 7-year

contract term, and the current contract is set to expire in September of 2027.

In accordance with governmental procurement best practices, the Rent Board is issuing this new competitive RFP

to solicit the most-qualified vendors to provide this critical technology service and to ensure sufficient

development time for a smooth transition to a new system, should a new vendor be selected. This solicitation

reflects the Rent Board’s ongoing commitment to modernizing its operations and ensuring that its regulatory and

service delivery functions are supported by a robust, integrated, and adaptable technology platform.

The Rent Board aims to implement a new system by April of 2027 in time for the fiscal year 2027-2028

registration period, with a 90-day stabilization and knowledge transfer period following completion of all system

requirements.

4. DRIVERS AND NEEDS

The goal of this project is to replace the Rent Board’s current system with a modern, modular, and scalable cloud-

based system that supports the full range of the agency’s operational, regulatory, and public service functions.

The Rent Board’s current system was launched in 2021 to consolidate multiple business processes into a

centralized, cloud-hosted platform and was designed to manage core agency functions including rent registration,

tenancy data tracking, housing counseling, hearings, petition workflows, public inquiries, and financial

transactions. While the current system improves on previous systems in several ways, the overall interface and

workflow processes are less efficient in many cases and often take more staff time when compared to previous,

customized software solutions. Since inception, the implementation has presented several ongoing challenges for

Rent Board staff:

• Limited configurability: Many workflows are rigid or hard-coded, making it difficult to adjust to new

regulations, policies, or procedures without vendor intervention.

• Integration constraints: The system does not integrate seamlessly with other tools, such as the City’s GIS

platform, financial systems, or external data sources.

• Performance issues: Staff have experienced slow load times, limited dashboard functionality, and

inconsistent system behavior that hinders productivity and public service.

• Reliance on outside tools: To supplement the system, staff rely on Property Finder, a custom dashboard tool

used to research property and unit data designed for the previous Rent Boad system, and are constantly

exporting, sorting and filtering both standard and customized reports.

To assess the public user experience, the Rent Board solicited feedback on our current system from Berkeley

landlords and tenants. Landlords, who must register their rental properties and pay fees, specifically reported

difficulties in the following areas: setting up an account, understanding what they owed in registration fees, and

general user friendliness. Landlords desired the following top three additional online services:

1. Book a housing counseling appointment

2. Automatic payments

3. Submit a petition

The system only offers tenants the ability to look up certain property/unit information. For this limited purpose,

tenants rated it as adequate, but desired the following top three additional online services:

1. Book a housing counselor appointment

2. Submit a petition

3. Submit a notice that tenancy information is incorrect

User feedback also suggests that the quality of a person’s initial experiences with the system is a predictor of

future use. For example, landlords who had negative initial experiences expressed a commitment to paper forms

and more analogue payment methods going forward despite later system improvements. This underscores the

City of Berkeley Rent Stabilization Board

Specification No. 26-11777-C

Page 3 of 20

Comprehensive Rental Information and Housing Services Management System Release Date 01/21/26

desire for a System that upon launch allows users to easily and intuitively obtain services from and conduct

business with the Rent Board.

Accordingly, the Rent Board seeks a system that is:

• User-centered, offering intuitive interfaces for internal users to manage business processes; for clients

to interact with the Rent Board and comply with the RSO; and for the general public to understand the

Rent Board’s work in advancing housing stability, equity, and transparency in Berkeley’s rental housing

market.

• Modular, flexible and configurable, allowing staff to manage and adapt workflows in response to the

changing regulatory environment.

• Cloud-based and secure, with scalable infrastructure and strong data protection including SOC 2 Type

II and ISO 27001 compliance.

• Integrated, enabling seamless coordination internally between all Rent Board workflows from rental

and property registration, finance and payment processing to housing counselor case management, as

well as externally with other City departments and external partners.

• Accessible and multilingual, ensuring inclusive service delivery for Berkeley’s diverse community.

• Insightful, with built-in analytics and dashboards that are customizable to each user, show a clear picture

of all activity related to a particular property and ensure date is aligned in order to support accurate data-

informed decision making.

The new system must be designed to serve all Rent Board workgroups through a unified platform that enables

seamless interoperability between modules and supports cross-functional workflows.

The Rent Board envisions that the new system will:

• Seamlessly integrate with online payment processing.

• Provide staff with easy access to related property documents through a comprehensive document

management system.

• Serve as the Rent Board’s case management system, rental registry, document management system and

CRM.

• Track and report on all payments received, and be able to provide reports, analytics, and dashboards for

all Rent Board functions.

• Be configurable and expandable to support changes in business processes, regulatory requirements, and

the types of data being collected and tracked over time.

To ensure alignment with broader City infrastructure and strategic goals, the system must integrate effectively

with the City’s Finance, GIS, and other related IT supported systems. It must also provide multilingual, Web

Content and Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) compliant user interfaces to ensure equitable access for all users,

including those with disabilities and those with limited English proficiency.

The platform must deliver measurable performance results, including system uptime of at least 99.95% and

average response times of under three seconds for all user-facing functions. A robust document management

system is also required to support the secure storage, retrieval, and sharing of case files, forms, and

correspondence across departments.

The selected vendor must also support a hybrid of Agile development methodologies that combines the structure

of phased development with the flexibility of Agile methodology, and show a commitment to collaborative

project management practices, enabling iterative design, stakeholder feedback, and continuous improvement

throughout the entire implementation lifecycle.

Lastly, the selected vendor must also provide comprehensive training, support, and documentation to ensure that

Rent Board staff can fully utilize the system’s capabilities, including role-based training for different user groups

and ongoing support for system administrators.

This is the opportunity summary page. It provides an overview of this opportunity and a preview of the attached documentation.

Comprehensive Rental Information and Housing Services Management System

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