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Not all requests for disability accommodations are reasonable. How can you tell which are and which aren’t?   While the COVID-19 pandemic may have kept people at home in 2020, it apparently didn’t keep them from suing for discrimination. There were 28,712 total fair housing complaints in that pandemic year, according to the National Fair Housing…

Ask anyone who works on a Senior Living Community how they like their job and I can almost guarantee that they will tell you they have a love-hate relationship with it. Most employees will tell you that they love working with seniors; that they are a nice group of people, and they have a bond with them that they have never experienced while…

  Holding. In late July 2022, the Oregon Supreme Court issued its ruling in Hickey v. Scott, 370 Or 97 (2022) that addressed the application of ORS 90.394(3).[1] The Court ruled that when issuing a termination notice for nonpayment of rent, the landlord must specify the “correct amount due to cure the default.” Hickey, 370 Or at 101. If the court…

Question 1 The law and MHCO ocupancy agreement both state that a landlord can screen an occupant for conduct or criminal history but not for credit history or income level.  If after screening a temporary occupant, the findings reveal that they have civil case(s) and/or eviction matters relating to previous rental history where the derogatory…

  The disparate impact rule also opens the door for groups that the FHA doesn’t list as protected classes to sue for housing discrimination, as illustrated by an important case from Pennsylvania. Situation: A domestic violence victim tells her landlord that she’s being stalked by her ex-boyfriend and needs to move out. When the landlord refuses…

  This article is general in nature and is not intended as legal advice for any specific issue that might arise, since every situation is different. Always consult a knowledgeable landlord attorney with your specific legal issues.    A very recent court case highlights the ongoing importance of always conducting background checks on potential…

  While enforcing legitimate and nondiscriminatory rental and community policies is allowed, an Oregon case serves as a reminder how policies that look neutral on their face may still be illegal if they have the effect of excluding people the FHA protects.   Situation: A landlord rejects a black prospect with a credit score of 680 because her…

Exempting a disabled tenant’s service animal from a no-pets policy is a common kind of reasonable accommodation. But a Florida case deals with what a landlord can do when those accepted service animals create a nuisance for other tenants.

   Fees for “Additional Occupants” or “Extra Vehicles” may be problematic. Rental agreements sometimes contain a space for “extra vehicle fees” or “extra occupant fees.” These fees may be problematic considering the limitations found in ORS 90.302.

  A somewhat odd case out of California illustrates another important qualifier of the landlord’s duty to provide a requested accommodation. Situation: A tenant with “electromagnetic hypersensitivity” (EHS), which causes him to be physically and neurologically affected by radiofrequency emissions from cell phone equipment, asks the city to…