Just this past month, the U.S Department of Housing and Development announced the publication of some guidelines for how owners of rental properties can comply with the Fair Housing Act as it applies to tenants requesting support animals in their homes.
This is familiar territory to us, as our CEO wrote an article for Forbes in December of 2018 about how landlords could navigate these rules.
Clearer Distinctions
In their press release, HUD says, “This new Assistance Animal Notice will help housing providers in this process by offering a step-by-step set of best practices for complying with the Act when assessing accommodation requests involving animals and information that a person may need to provide about his or her disability-related need for the requested accommodation, including supporting information from a health care professional.”
The notice delineates in detail the differences between service animals and support animals, which can be a tricky distinction for the owners of rental properties.
To read the notice in all its specific detail, click here: https://www.hud.gov/sites/dfiles/PA/documents/HUDAsstAnimalNC1-28-2020.pdf
