Fair Housing Complaints

How Do You Know If Your Actions Are Discriminatory?

Housing discrimination is often very subtle and you may not even know that you’re doing it. For instance, a family of four was looking to rent a townhome in a rental community. When they came to view the property, the twin five-year-old boys were running about, playing in the unsafe street at the front of the community. Given that the tenants are a family with young boys, the property manager only showed them available homes in the back of the community by the park. Is this discrimination?

In another scenario, a property manager was trying to rent out the last few condo units in a mid-rise building. She had a few units on the third floor available and one on the first floor close to the street. When a man in a wheelchair came by for a viewing, she only showed him the unit on the first floor because it was more accessible. Is this discrimination?

In both the scenarios above, it was ruled that both those property managers were discriminating, either on the basis of familial status or disability. In both cases, the property managers lost their licenses. Even if well-intentioned housing discrimination comes in many forms and is often subtle. 

Reasons for Housing Discrimination Complaints

There aren’t any hard-and-fast rules around what discrimination is, which is why it’s necessary to be careful with all tenants at all points of the renter-landlord relationship, not just during the application stage. The following are indications of discrimination:

• A refusal to sell, rent, or show available housing.
• Requiring different terms and conditions for identical dwellings, i.e., charging a higher rent or security deposit for different tenants.
• Being told that the dwelling isn’t right for you or your family.
• Being told that housing isn’t available in an apartment building with a “For Rent” sign outside.
• Housing advertisements that say “no kids” or “adults only.”
• A refusal to make a reasonable accommodation or allow a modification to be made to the dwelling in order for it to be more accessible to a renter with a disability. 
• Harassment or intimidation of a renter.
• Offering non‐standard and unfavorable terms in the purchase of a home or a property insurance policy.
• Terms of availability that change between a phone contact and an in‐person visit.
• Being steered to racially segregated neighborhoods during your home search.
• Excessive or inappropriate questioning upon requesting information about a property.

Filing Fair Housing Complaints

The internet has made it easy for anybody to file a discrimination complaint through the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development’s online complaint form. After a tenant submits a complaint, there may be an investigation into your practices as a landlord. If the claims are proven true, the case will go to court. Otherwise, the case will be dismissed, but the renter can still take you to court over the issue. 

Here are some situations to which Fair Housing laws apply:

1. Advertising a rental property: Even if it’s not done purposefully, discriminatory wording in a rental listing is illegal and damaging. 
2. Requiring a higher security deposit or a cosigner for certain tenants.
3. Providing different services or facilities during the tenancy to some renters while not providing them to others because of their personal background.
4. Terminating the tenancy based on someone’s protected class.

In most housing discrimination cases, the landlord is not even aware that their actions were illegal, which is why it is important for every landlord to completely understand what constitutes a discrimination case on a federal, state, and local level.