In a press release issued last week, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) approved a settlement agreement concluding a disability housing discrimination complaint against the owners and property managers at a community in Pennsylvania. The total amount to be paid by the Respondents is $80,000. In their complaint, two residents asserted that…

Although the economic and personal impact of the global pandemic continues to dominate the headlines, I am seeing HUD (as well as various state, city, and county agencies) ramping up efforts on pending housing discrimination complaints. As a part of the Fair Housing Act, investigators are dual tasked when a complaint is filed: (1) to…

The United States Congress (as well as any number of state, city, and county legislatures) have been at work on various pandemic relief efforts (as they should be).  As these efforts go forward, the apartment management industry needs to be aware the next set of legislative initiatives that might, for example, mandate that property owners…

For many Americans who live in apartment homes, rent for May 2020 is due tomorrow. As noted earlier this month, a best guess is that around 70% of residents made their April 2020 rent payments on time. That is, of course, a lower number than we would have expected under normal circumstances as each week…

I will get back to how the pandemic is impacting the professional apartment management industry in my next post, but I wanted to note that at the end of March, the U.S. Department of Housing & Urban Development (HUD) announced that it settled a fair housing discrimination action from California in which allegations of sexual…

As I type this from my basement office, reports are that somewhere between 25% to 33% of renters did not pay their full monthly rent on or about April 1. That is, of course, a significantly higher figure than any other month to my memory. Leasing office team members from California to Florida are working…

Most likely lost in the COVID-19 news obviously dominating the world right now, last week the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) announced that it awarded $40 million to various fair housing organizations across the nation to test compliance with the federal Fair Housing Act (FHA) and its state law counterparts. The money…