Illegal Immigration & Renting

I believe it is against fair housing to discriminate against national origin. That includes asking for green cards and country of birth.

How do I know it is illegal?

We'll I own a 40 unit building, and manage a few more hundred units, that is government housing financed by the USDA. The property is about 80% Chinesse and as part of the application process I was asking for documents to prove that all tenants were legal.

The government regulator from the USDA gave me a little hand slap saying that asking for this info was against fair housing and I was to stop. So I asked if that meant that I couldn't use legal status to deny an individual subsidized housing. The regulatory told me that was correct. If an illegal income qualified and had positive references then they qualified for the housing.

Not saying it is right to use tax dollars to house illegals.....but it's the law.

That isn't entirely true.  While Fair Housing laws do protect against disrimination based on National Origin, they don't protect against "not being leased an apartment because you are in the UNited States illegally."   For example, if you fill out an application and it asks "Are you a United States Citizen" (which is okay to ask), if you answer "NO" you can then be required to provide documentation proving your legal status in the country.  In this case, asking for a green card, passport, Visa, etc is within the legal rights of the landlord.

Absolutely, but proving they were discriminated against is fairly difficult.  

My point of reference is Fair Housing Act as it relates to USDA financed property. There are citizenship declaration when it comes to HUD housing but again it is not used to deny housing.

So is the USDA saying (since its "their" property) that "we have already verified legal status stop asking?"  I'm confused. 

yes, that is true.

Yep, but landlords can make up any reason they wish (your credit score is three points too low, for example--they aren't required to show the credit scores for other people that they have rented too).

So are you now saying that our landlords should have the power/burden to certify which documents are legal and which ones aren't?

I don't get that from my post, and if you do you didn't read it well.  I was mentioning that it isn't as big a deal as it is being made out to be.  Most of them have fraudulent papers already.  This covers the landlord cause they don't know if they are fraudulent or not.  They just have to prove that they were asked for and were presented with what appeared to be correct documentation.  It works the same way with employment.  Most companies don't know they have illegals working for them until the IRS comes back and says this is not a valid Social Security Number.

That would be knowingly rent to an illegal immigrant. That is the only thing that will get them in trouble.

My point is that if I am a landlord:

1).  Why do I care if my tenants are legal or illegal immigrants who pay their rent on time and pump money INTO the local economy?

2).  Now the government is going to fine ME because I was unable to distinguish between a valid and fraudulent set of papers.

My whole issue with immigration is that there are similiar issues across the board regarding people without insurance driving, people taking advantage of free healthcare, people presenting fraudulent identification to achieve other purposes.  Why aren't we talking about the issues holistically instead of segmented a particular sect of the population, which by association, includes a number of LEGAL citizens.  

OK perhaps I'm not being clear enough.  The government will not fine you if you ask for proof and are given said proof.  You do not....Repeat....You do not have to know how to identify fraudulent papers in order to rent to someone.  If you are told by said government that the person is illegal and you do not force them to move out and allow them to stay being presented with different papers then you will be fined.  Just like if you hire someone who has given you a social security card and are told that it is not valid and rehire the person under a different fraudulent document.  You will be fined.  It happens everyday in businesses.  My mother who is a Human Resources Director had to leave a company because they kept hiring the same people back with fraudulent documents.  The hopes are that if we make it harder for them it will eliminate a lot of the other problems that are takiing place.  This is just one town.  A town among many in the US that have implimented siimiliar laws mind you but still just one town.

I think C-Ray's point is the opposite of this.  You (as landlord) won't be fined if you have documents showing citizenship, regardless of their authenticity