Reasonable accommodation

The federal Fair Housing Act protects you if you have a disability. Your landlord must make reasonable changes to rules and policies so you can use and enjoy your home.

If you have a disability and need a change to a rule or service, ask your landlord in writing. Federal law counts a refusal to make a reasonable accommodation (a change that gives you equal use of your home) as discrimination.

You can raise as a defense that your landlord did not give a reasonable accommodation. That is a change to a rule or service that a person with a disability needs to use the home equally. The court must deny the eviction if three things are true. The landlord had a duty to offer one. The landlord failed to. There is a causal link (a connection) between the request and the conduct in the case.

If you have a disability, Pennsylvania law protects you in another way. Your landlord cannot refuse a reasonable change to rules, policies, practices, or services that you need. The change must be one that lets you use and enjoy your home like other renters. The PHRC (the state civil rights agency) gives an example of illegal discrimination: refusing a request for closer parking from a tenant with a disability.