How do I find out why my rental application was declined?
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How do I find out why my rental application was declined?
My son was banned from our rental community after a violent episode . He lived there 6 months and has been gone 6 months. I asked the manager if he could come back and she said we could give our 30 day notice. i applied for an apartment and was declined because of my rental history. What can I do? My credit was approved and my rent was never late.
Asked on June 15, 2012 under Real Estate Law, California
Answers:
SJZ, Member, New York Bar / FreeAdvice Contributing Attorney
Answered 11 years ago | Contributor
The only way to find out why your application was denied would be to sue the landlord and/or management company and use the legal mechanism of "discovery," which is available in lawsuits (e.g. written interrogatories or questions; document production requests; depositions--though those last are expensive) to get the information.
Note though that as long as they are not discriminating on certain protected bases, such as against you due to your race, a landlord is entitled to decide who to rent to and who to not rent to; a landlord may decline to rent to someone with good credit and references, for example, if there had been some past problem with a memmber of that person's family. Therefore, you may not have a valid legal claim or cause of action.
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