The Fair Tenant Screening Act addresses the lack of affordability, accuracy, and access to justice in tenant screening. Renters are routinely denied housing for reasons they never get to know by screening reports they never get to see. Low-income renters and homeless families are spending hundreds of dollars on repeated screening fees ending up penniless to pay for a first month’s rent or move-in deposit. Domestic violence records can be improperly included in a screening report causing a survivor to be illegally denied.

Screening reports many times contain incomplete, inaccurate or misleading information. When a tenant is threatened with an eviction lawsuit the record will often not reflect if the tenant won in court, or distinguish if the tenant was evicted due to a foreclosure at no fault of their own or even if they were never actually evicted at all. As a result many tenants waive their rights under threat of legal action because the simple filing of an eviction lawsuit is enough to permanently mark their record. The misleading record will systematically result in the denial of housing, effectively chilling a tenant’s rights and access to justice.

To see a webinar on the Fair Tenant Screening Act (FTSA), go to Housing Alliance Learn at Lunch: Fair Tenant Screening Act, Part 2 101.

Watch a video from Northwest Justice Project on An In-Depth Look at Tenant Screening in Washington State:

Watch a video on the Fair Tenant Screening Act:

The TU partners with the Washington Low Income Housing Alliance, Children’s Home Society of Washington, Washington State Coalition Against Domestic Violence and other housing advocates who are working to win fair tenant screening statewide.