Worldwide · facebook.com
Facebook Marketplace rental alerts, since Facebook stopped sending them
Marketplace carries private landlords you will not find on a portal, and offers essentially no reliable way to be told when one posts.
One-time payment · No subscription · Runs on your own machine
The site with the least alerting and some of the best listings
Marketplace is a strange case. In a lot of cities it carries a genuinely valuable seam of rentals, from private landlords, sublets and room shares to people leaving a flat mid-lease, which never touch a portal because the poster has no interest in dealing with an agency. And its tooling for finding out about them is the weakest of any site on this list.
There is no email alert for a Marketplace search. Saved-search notifications inside the app have been unreliable for years and were widely reported as withdrawn, which is why an entire cottage industry of third-party Marketplace alert tools exists. What people actually do instead is open the app and refresh, repeatedly, which works exactly as well as it sounds.
This is the site where a monitor is least of a luxury. Notifio loads your Marketplace search in a real browser every 30 seconds and emails you when something new appears. Because Marketplace requires a logged-in session to show results, you sign in once through Notifio's built-in browser and it keeps that session for subsequent checks.
Two honest warnings. Marketplace rental listings include a meaningful amount of noise and a non-trivial amount of fraud, of which deposit-before-viewing is the classic. Being alerted first is worth a lot; it is not a reason to skip the due diligence you would do anyway. And because Marketplace requires an account, the monitor depends on your session staying valid, so expect to sign in again occasionally.
Sources, so you can check whether Facebook Marketplace has changed this since we wrote it: Facebook – saving searches in Marketplace
Setting up a Facebook Marketplace monitor
Example search URL
https://www.facebook.com/marketplace/london/propertyrentals?maxPrice=1500&sortBy=creation_time_descendLondon property rentals under £1,500, newest first. sortBy=creation_time_descend is the parameter that keeps new posts at the top.
- 1
Sign in through Notifio's built-in browser first
Marketplace shows nothing useful to a signed-out session. Use Open in Browser, log in to Facebook once, and close it. This step is not optional here.
- 2
Use the propertyrentals category, not general search
The /marketplace/<city>/propertyrentals path filters to rentals. A plain keyword search will fill your inbox with furniture.
- 3
Sort by newest and set a price ceiling
Add sortBy=creation_time_descend. Marketplace's default ordering is a relevance mix that reshuffles constantly, which is the worst possible input for a page comparison.
- 4
Expect to re-authenticate now and then
Facebook sessions expire. If a Marketplace monitor goes quiet for a suspiciously long time, open the in-app browser and check you are still logged in.
What to know about monitoring Facebook Marketplace
- Does it need a login?
- Required. Marketplace will not show results to a signed-out session, so you must log in once through Notifio's built-in browser, and occasionally again.
- How the page loads
- Heavily JavaScript-driven with an infinite-scroll feed. Notifio watches the first screen of results, which is where new posts land when you sort by newest, which is why the sort parameter matters so much here.
- Auto-reply on this site
- Marketplace contact is a Messenger conversation rather than a form, so auto-reply does not apply. Notifio alerts you; you send the message.
Facebook Marketplace alerts: common questions
Can I not just save the search in the Facebook app?
You can save it, but the notifications have been unreliable for years and many people report never receiving them. That gap is why third-party Marketplace alert tools exist at all.
Do I have to stay logged in to Facebook?
Yes. Marketplace shows results only to a signed-in session, so Notifio uses the session you create in its built-in browser. It stays on your machine, and you will need to refresh it occasionally.
Are Marketplace rental listings safe?
Treat them with more caution than a portal listing. Anyone can post, and requests for a deposit or holding fee before a viewing are the standard scam pattern. Speed helps you get to a real listing first; it does not make a fake one real.
Does it work for Facebook housing groups too?
Group pages are more awkward than Marketplace because of how they load, and results vary by group. Marketplace search pages with a sort applied are the reliable case.
Most people watch more than one site
Notifio runs every monitor at once, so Facebook Marketplace does not have to be the only search you are watching. These are the ones people usually pair it with.
Start watching Facebook Marketplace today
One payment, a lifetime licence, and every monitor you can think of. Mac and Windows, updates included, nothing to cancel.