HUD TO PROVIDE FURTHER GUIDANCE ON DISCRIMINATORY EFFECTS IN RENTAL HOUSING
In February
of last year, the US Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) issued a
Discriminatory Effects Final Rule to formalize a national standard for
determining Fair Housing violations.
“Through the
issuance of this Rule, HUD is reaffirming its commitment to enforcing the Fair
Housing Act in a consistent and uniform manner,” said HUD secretary Shaun
Donovan. The Fair Housing Act prohibits housing practices that result in
disparate impact on a group of persons because of race, color, religion, sex,
handicap, familial status or national origin.
The practice of running criminal background
checks on potential tenants may now be prohibited under the Discriminatory
Effects Standard Final Rule.
Many in the
rental housing industry have expressed serious concern over the final rule,
specifically, the limitations placed on tenant screening. Criminal background
checks provide some level of assurance that measures are being taken to uphold
resident safety and viability. By restricting a property owner’s right to
screen an applicant’s criminal history, this new rule would seem to
dramatically increase the property owner’s risk for liability.
A property
owner can be held liable for crimes committed by their tenants as criminal
activity has a negative impact on the other residents and the surrounding
community. The best way to reduce the likelihood of criminal activity and to
convince a judge, if necessary, that all reasonable steps were taken to prevent
such activity, is to perform a thorough background check on all potential
residents prior to their moving into the community.
It presents a large problem for
property owners if they are not allowed to perform criminal background checks
and are then held liable for a resident’s criminal activity.
Acting
Assistant Secretary for Fair Housing, Bryan Greene, has stated that HUD is
working on outlining additional guidance for impacted industries. Operating
guidelines could be released as early as this summer and would more clearly define
what qualifies as “unjustified” discrimination, including information pertaining
to criminal background screening.
Visit www.erentalservicesinc.com for
more information as it becomes available.
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