Has anyone challenged "by the bed" student apartments as unfair housing?
March 12, 2015 5:35 PM   Subscribe

My old student neighborhood in southern California has several new luxury apartment buildings marketed toward students, which rent apartments with "by the bed" leases instead of normal per-apartment-unit leases. This setup is intended for single students, and it seems complicated, impractical, and overly expensive to rent if you're a couple and/or have children. Familial status is a protected class under the US Fair Housing Act. Has anyone challenged housing providers who do this? What could happen if somebody challenged them?

These are the marketing websites for three of these apartment complexes: The Loop, Icon, and Campus 880. They are not affiliated with the local university or community college.

My reason to ask: this neighborhood is majority typical-college-age students, and I (and a number of other people) think the neighborhood could be healthier if it developed a more diverse population with more older adults and families. I'm concerned that these new "student housing" buildings are not good for the neighborhood, so I'm wondering if I should ask the local tenants union to consider challenging them, and I'd like to have some resources to back up my wondering.

I only found a little bit about this on the web. I found a set of slides called "Fair Housing Issues For Student Housing" from a student housing convention - starting at slide 21, it says "Occupancy cannot be so restrictive as to operate with the intent to exclude children in particular" and has some recommendations, such as "Do not count a child under a certain age as an occupant". I also found a press release from a firm that advises student housing providers that says "Scion is also now offering a Fair Housing training program custom-built for student housing, including by-the-bed leasing environments which can present unique challenges regarding familial status protection and other requirements under the law." This report titled "Familial Status Discrimination in the University Neighborhood" from Central New York Fair Housing suggests that serious fair housing problems are pretty common in student neighborhoods.

All of this adds up to me guessing that these housing providers are on somewhat shaky ground. Have any of them been sued? Where can I learn more?
posted by dreamyshade to Law & Government (11 answers total) 6 users marked this as a favorite
 
When I had a kid as an undergrad, my university's lawyers were very, very confident that it was acceptable to kick me out of student housing on those grounds. The housing office actually tried to work with us on a way to stay in student housing and was then advised that it was too much of a liability no matter what we signed. My understanding was that housing intended for registered students was under no obligation to accept tenants who were not registered students. So there may be different legal issues for different kinds of "student housing"--if it's provided by the school, for students of that school, they may be on sturdier ground than if they were just generally marketing to "students."

That is to say: it's plausible that it looks like there's precedent to discriminate based on how university-run student housing works, but that it really doesn't apply.
posted by cogitron at 5:43 PM on March 12, 2015


Some of it will depend on the local laws. I have been told that in my jurisdiction it is acceptable to limit new leases on zero-bedroom units (efficiencies/studios) to one resident. In effect, that means kids under 18 aren't allowed (since they can't sign a lease, and only one person is allowed in the unit). There may be a similar dodge in your jurisdiction.

Realistically, if you want to limit the number of these buildings in your area, I'd recommend getting involved earlier in the process -- track what's being planned for development, who's buying properties and applying for zoning variances. Attend zoning meetings. I think a neighborhood has a much better chance of blocking future buildings from being built than they do of retroactively getting a type of building leasing scheme declared invalid.
posted by pie ninja at 6:19 PM on March 12, 2015 [1 favorite]


One edge case to search for would be whether these residences have ever done anything about a resident becoming pregnant.
posted by zippy at 6:28 PM on March 12, 2015


Response by poster: These are privately owned buildings, yes. They're not associated with the local university or community college, and they don't formally limit residents to students; they just heavily market toward students. These buildings are in an unincorporated part of Santa Barbara County, if that helps or is interesting. I'd also be curious to see any news articles (or similar) about people trying to block this kind of apartment complex from being established, if anyone can find any.
posted by dreamyshade at 6:37 PM on March 12, 2015


There may be overlap between these and SROs, single room occupancy buildings, which historically serve a very different purpose.
posted by alms at 6:39 PM on March 12, 2015


My building is marketed to students (but is "by unit"), and we have some new luxury apartments NEAR campus that are pre-furnished. My understanding for my area (Philly) is that they are marketed to students, and make it easier for students (i.e., no credit check), but they do not preclude other residents. My building in particular is a combination of students and others, there is at least one baby in our building.
posted by DoubleLune at 6:53 PM on March 12, 2015


Is there a local organization that offers free or low cost legal aid? I think you'd need to ask a lawyer to understand what's relevant locally.
posted by three_red_balloons at 6:54 PM on March 12, 2015


The California Department of Consumer Affairs will probably be the quickest way to find your answer. They publish this Tenants & Landlords guide [PDF] which is good for most general questions but I'd just call them directly: (800) 952-5210. I have talked to them in the past and found them to be helpful and knowledgeable, even if it's just to refer you to someone who will know.

It may not even matter of it's been challenged; if it's not legal there will be some agency (perhaps LA Code Compliance) that will be happy to open an investigation and collect those fines that rack up daily.

If you want to roll up your sleeves, CA Civil Code 1940.x covers landlord/tenant law.
posted by Room 641-A at 7:39 PM on March 12, 2015 [2 favorites]


Student-only private apartment complexes are something Madison, WI has been trying to get away from. This planning document hints at the problem under the very euphemistically-titled "Mifflin Character Area" section, and it's to the point that developers are shying away from making any more, partially because they simply won't be approved.

Meanwhile, someone I know who works as a leasing agent for one of the big by-the-bed towers has said that adults' applications are generally "lost" or otherwise delayed until they can find a nice student to rent to instead. This keeps the college kids' parents from complaining, and isn't hard to get away with given our abysmal vacancy rate and that adults (with or without kids) don't much like the price tags on those beds in the first place. As far as I know though nobody's ever actually sued; I'll report back if our Tenant Resource Center has more to say on the topic.
posted by teremala at 7:44 PM on March 12, 2015


My gut reaction is that you'd have a hard time proving discrimination under the Fair Housing Act or its California equivalent, unless a family actually tried to rent a room (or multiple rooms, since occupancy limits are often legal) and was denied for that reason. And property managers aren't dumb; they're unlikely to explicitly deny on those grounds, but instead engage in "constructive" discrimination (as teremala describes), which is much harder to prove.

I think your best bet is to get involved with the zoning and approval process and try to block any further such developments. (The fact that you're in an unincorporated area might complicate this, since any process in place might be cursory at best.) You might try dropping a line to the person who started this thread and ask her whether she has any tips for you.
posted by Johnny Assay at 7:50 PM on March 12, 2015


Response by poster: Thanks everyone for the suggestions! I actually live a few hundred miles away now, but I still have close friends there who are involved in the community, and I help from a distance when I can (I still have a lot of affection for it).

I agree that proactively arguing against new ones could be helpful. There's an upcoming one in the process, and residents are paying more attention to planning issues now. It can be hard though to convince the county to care about what people want in this unincorporated area with mostly short-term residents, and it can also be hard for residents to make it to 9:30 am weekday planning hearings, especially since the hearings are 30+ minutes away by bus, plus time getting to the stop...

Thanks Room 641-A, calling the California Department of Consumer Affairs sounds interesting!

And thanks teremala, that Mifflin area is very interesting - "it is located close to campus and has an identity within the community as a location associated with the 1960s student counter culture" describes this area too. The Mifflin Street Block Party even sounds like the local Floatopia/Deltopia, a spring block party that has had problems.

When I lived in the area as half an adult non-student couple, we inquired about renting a whole unit at one of these places, and they showed us a model unit, but they were sort of slow and unenthusiastic about following up with us. I don't know if it was that we wanted to do something unusual or they just weren't very good at marketing apartments.
posted by dreamyshade at 2:43 AM on March 13, 2015


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