And don’t be thrown off by what the resident says or when he says it. Whenever a resident raises a disability-related reason for violating the lease or community rules, you should treat it as a reasonable accommodation request. Under the FHA, an applicant makes a request for a reasonable accommodation whenever he makes clear that he is requesting an exception, change, or adjustment to a rule, policy, practice, or service because of a disability. The law doesn’t require that requests for reasonable accommodations be made in a particular manner or at a particular time.
Don’t dismiss it as an excuse or ignore the resident’s request for an exception to the rules simply because he doesn’t appear to be disabled. The law covers a variety of physical and mental impairments, characterized by few, if any, obvious symptoms to suggest that a particular person qualifies under the FHA’s disability-related provisions. Federal guidelines permit you to request additional information necessary to evaluate the request if either the disability or the need for the requested accommodation isn’t readily apparent.
