Privacy Policy

What we collect

Account details (email, password), profile details you provide (name, address, phone), and the tenancy data you enter to use the service: property addresses, tenant names and contact details, rent amounts and payment records, bond and inspection records, and any documents you upload (tenancy agreements, Healthy Homes statements, insurance documents, and similar). On Pro, this can also include income and expense records, mileage logs, and Xero connection details if you choose to connect Xero.

If you advertise a property and turn applications on, we also hold the applications people send you. Those are yours rather than ours: see the two sections below.

If you enquire about a property advertised on RentGuide

You do not need a RentGuide account to ask about a property, and you should not have to tell the owner anything about yourself to arrange a viewing.

When you send a question through a listing we collect your name, your email address, your phone number if you give one, and your question. It goes to the owner of that property so they can reply to you, and to nobody else. We do not use it for anything of our own, we do not sell it, and it is not used for advertising.

We keep it for up to 90 days from the day you send it, then erase your name, contact details and question automatically. The owner keeps a note that an enquiry was made, with nothing in it that identifies you. 90 days is our own choice rather than a period set by law: the Privacy Act says personal information should be kept only as long as it is needed.

You can ask us what we hold about you, ask us to correct it, or ask us to erase it before the 90 days are up. Email our Privacy Officer at privacy@rentguide.co.nz and say which property you enquired about.

The owner of the property is responsible for what they do with your details after we pass them on. RentGuide does not vet owners, inspect properties, or check anything an owner has written in a listing.

If you apply for a property advertised on RentGuide

You do not need a RentGuide account to apply, and there is no fee to you, ever. RentGuide does not charge people who apply for a rental.

The owner of the property is the one collecting your information, not RentGuide. Their name and a contact address are shown on the form before you fill anything in, because you are entitled to know who is asking and where to write to them. We hold the application for the owner and we never use it for anything of our own: we do not sell it, we do not use it for advertising, and we draw no statistics from it. We do not decide who gets the tenancy, and we do not score, rank or check anybody.

The form asks for your name, your email, a phone number if you want to give one, whether you are 18 or over, how many people would live there, the names of anyone else moving in, when you would like to start, and contact details for up to two referees. It asks whether the owner may contact those referees, and whether they may get a credit report about you if you get as far as discussing an offer. It asks about pets or smoking only where the owner has said the property restricts them.

It does not ask for a date of birth, identity documents, income, payslips, bank statements or your employment history, and there is no box for anything else. Only your name, your email and whether you are 18 or over are required.

When you apply you get your own link, by email and on screen. It shows everything held about you, lets you correct anything that is wrong, lets you ask for your application to be kept so you do not have to fill it in again, and lets you withdraw. You do not need an account for any of that. Anyone holding that link can see your application, so keep it to yourself.

If nothing comes of your application, your details are erased automatically 90 days after you apply. The owner keeps a record that somebody applied on that date, with nothing in it that identifies you. There are two exceptions. If you ask for your application to be kept, it is. And if the owner offers you a tenancy or starts negotiating one with you, the Residential Tenancies Act requires that correspondence to be kept during the tenancy and for twelve months after it ends, so it is not erased on our timetable.

Because the owner is the one collecting it, ask them first if you want your information corrected or returned. Their contact address is on the form and in the email we sent you. You can also email our Privacy Officer at privacy@rentguide.co.nz and say which property you applied for. RentGuide does not vet owners, inspect properties, or check anything an owner has written in a listing.

How we use it

To run the service: showing your properties and tenancy records back to you, generating documents you request (tenancy agreements, notices, tax summaries), sending compliance reminders, and processing subscription payments. We don't sell your data, and we don't use it for advertising.

Who we share it with

• Supabase, our database and file storage provider. Your data is hosted on Supabase's infrastructure, in their Asia-Northeast (Tokyo) region. Supabase holds this information on our behalf, under our instructions, the same as any New Zealand-based provider would; we remain responsible for it under the Privacy Act 2020.
• Stripe, for subscription billing. Stripe handles your payment details directly, RentGuide never sees or stores your card number.
• Resend, our email provider, for the reminder and enquiry emails we send you, and for notices a landlord chooses to send to their tenants by email through RentGuide. Reminder and enquiry emails contain the property address they relate to. A notice sent by email contains the tenant's name and email address, the landlord's name and email address, and the full text of the notice, which can include rent and payment details. Resend processes that on our behalf to deliver the email, and is based outside New Zealand.
• Vercel, who host the RentGuide application itself. Your requests pass through their infrastructure to reach us. Vercel also counts page views for us, so we can see which pages people use. That counting sets no cookie and builds no profile: it records the page, roughly where in the world the request came from, and what kind of device it was, and it is not linked to your account or to you.
• Xero, only if you connect it yourself on Pro, to sync rent and expense records to your own Xero organisation.

We don't share your data with anyone else.

Tenant information entered by a landlord

A tenant's name, contact details, and tenancy information are entered into RentGuide by their landlord, not by the tenant themselves. If you're a tenant and your landlord uses RentGuide, we hold this information to help your landlord run the tenancy (rent tracking, notices, compliance records), and you have the same rights over it as anyone else under this policy. Ask your landlord, or contact us directly, to see, correct, or ask questions about what's held about you. We haven't yet had this reviewed against the Privacy Act's rules on collecting information indirectly (Information Privacy Principle 3A). Landlords should let their tenants know they use RentGuide in the meantime.

Your rights

Under the Privacy Act 2020, you can ask to see what personal information we hold about you, ask us to correct it, or ask us to delete your account and data. Contact us to make any of these requests.

How long we keep it

While your account is active. If you close your account, we delete your data within a reasonable period, except where we're required to keep records for tax or legal reasons.

If something goes wrong

If we become aware of a privacy breach that has caused, or is likely to cause, anyone serious harm, we'll notify the Privacy Commissioner and everyone affected, as required under the Privacy Act 2020.

Cookies

We use a small number of essential cookies to keep you signed in, and one on the demo to remember what you did there while you look around. We don't use tracking or advertising cookies, and our page-view counting sets none, which is why this site has no cookie banner.

Who runs RentGuide

RentGuide is operated by Josh Nguyen, based in Auckland, New Zealand. Full registered business details will be added here once company registration is complete; in the meantime, contact hello@rentguide.co.nz for anything about the service, this policy, or your data.

Privacy Officer

Josh Nguyen is RentGuide's privacy officer, as required under the Privacy Act 2020. Contact: hello@rentguide.co.nz.

Contact

Questions about this policy or your data: hello@rentguide.co.nz.