The Fair Credit Reporting Act gives you rights as both a tenancy seeker and a tenant. This federal law requires a landlord who refuses or refuses your tenant application based on the information in a tenant due diligence report to notify you. This notification is called an “adverse action” and must: There are, of course, legal reasons you can rely on to deny requests. Otherwise, you will have to accept the very first request every time! Take the time to familiarize yourself with these reasons and how they fuel your business decisions. The tenant selection process begins with your rental notice and ends with the signing of the lease and the handing over of the keys. In between, however, you`ll need to deal with many potential tenants and you`ll need a clearly defined method for determining which tenants are applying for are the best and which tenant lease applications you should reject. Property managers and landlords can follow legal requirements and protect themselves from discrimination complaints by following these steps to refuse a rental applicant the right way. However, what about credit check fees? The landlord does the credit check and shows several things that are not desirable and do not meet the criteria, but the landlord sent the applicant the pre-qualification checklist and warned them that the fee is not refundable (because it costs the landlord to do these checks). I do not think they should be refundable. Instead, the landlord was simply wasting time with an applicant who did not meet the criteria at all, simply from the pre-qualification checklist sent to the applicant before the application was sent.
If the landlord must reimburse these fees for each applicant who is not eligible, the law seems biased to say that the landlord must generally opt for the principle of first come, first served, knowing that the next in the queue may not be eligible (from other sources) but must still give him the opportunity to complete the application. Then they would fill it out completely without paying attention to the prequalification checklist that would be sent to them, and then they would claim the money that has already been spent on the credit check. 8. A landlord may legally reject an applicant who smokes tobacco or cannabis. This also applies if an applicant smokes cannabis for medical reasons and her doctor has confirmed in writing that the drug has been recommended for medical purposes. 3. In most areas, a landlord can legally reject an applicant with a criminal past. This is not the case in Oakland. This city passed an ordinance in January 2020 prohibiting criminal background checks on tenants.
In areas where it is legal to conduct a criminal background check, the landlord should ensure that a criminal background check is accurate, as many reports contain false information. For example, some reports include convictions of others with the same name but not the same date of birth or other identifying information such as race, ethnicity, or nationality. Regardless of the rejection letter you use for rental applications, you must provide certain information under the Fair Credit Reporting Act. To find out how many people you should allow in one of your rental properties, check the relevant occupancy laws. A good rule of thumb is two people per habitable room plus an extra person. For more information on occupation laws and how they work, check out our full article here. 1. A landlord can legally reject an applicant who has not paid the screening fee specified in the application.
She may also indicate these fees orally during the interview process. If an applicant does not pay this fee, they have not yet completed the application process for the unit. 9. The landlord can legally reject an applicant who has not completed the tenancy application. A landlord should also look for significant gaps in an applicant`s tenancy history. For example, if an applicant lived in an apartment from 2019 to 2020 and in another apartment from 2017 to 2018, the landlord can ask where the applicant lived between 2018 and 2019. Credit scores are indicators of financial history and, therefore, the law allows their use as a determining factor when reviewing lease applications. However, keep in mind that you need to be consistent in your decision-making when using credit scores as a factor in your choice. A landlord can reject a rental application for many reasons, but not for illegal reasons.
A landlord who has just started work should review the California Department of Fair Employment and Housing (DFEH) rules regarding housing discrimination. The ministry`s rules list the illegal grounds for refusing or discriminating against a tenant. The problem is not whether or not you want to refuse the rental to someone, but whether or not you have the right to refuse their request. Due to discrimination and other immoral practices, there are now laws that restrict why and how landlords can reject tenants` claims. If you simply tell a tenancy applicant that it won`t work, but you don`t give them reasons, they can sue for discrimination, even if you based your decision on legal grounds.