What is landlord retaliation?
Unlawful landlord retaliation occurs when a landlord uses his authority to punish a tenant who exercises his legal rights. Tenant protection laws in most states provide tenants legal protection from retaliatory eviction and other landlord retaliatory actions.
While state laws prohibiting landlord retaliation may vary by state, most commonly, statutes address issues regarding tenant complaint to a landlord or government agency; tenant involvement in a tenants’ organization; tenants’ exercise of legal right; and presumed retaliation if negative reaction by landlord is within a specified time of a tenant’s action.
In many states, tenant protection laws presume a landlord has a retaliatory motive if the landlord takes action to evict the tenant or takes some other retaliatory action within six months after the tenant has exercised a tenant legal right.
As examples of a tenant exercising a legal right:
- Tenant filing complaint with the landlord or a public agency regarding the condition of the rental unit, including issues of habitability, fair housing discrimination, health and safety, and repairs
- Tenant notifying landlord of the use of repair and deduct remedy for defective property conditions
- Tenant notifying an appropriate public agency for health, safety violations, and/or requesting property inspection and remediation of conditions
- Tenant initiated lawsuit against landlord for defective conditions of rental unit
Landlord retaliatory conduct can take many forms. A landlord is generally considered to be retaliating if he takes any of the following actions after a tenant has exercised a legal right:
- Refusing to renew a lease
- Filing an eviction proceeding
- Increasing the tenant’s rent
- Restricting the tenant’s use of the premises
- Refusing to provide or reducing essential services
- Terminating a tenancy
- Threatening a tenant
- Harassment or hostile behavior toward a tenant
- Interfering with the tenant’s rights under the lease agreement