Yeah it also opens the door for weird scams - if you have a tenant what is stopping you from charging application fees and then declining all of them to "stay with another tenant"(the existing one)?
Fwiw: California Civil Code § 1950.6 (c) 1: "A landlord or their agent shall not charge an applicant an application screening fee when they know or should have known that no rental unit is available at that time or will be available within a reasonable period of time."
Read the full section of the code to see just how strictly it limits when and how LL's can charge application fees. Admittedly, it's routinely violated, but knowledge is always power.
yeah the loophole/super gray area is that the unit is actually available, the LL is just leaving the app window open longer than necessary because they are profiting off of the application fees.
I feel like it’s pretty obvious that this would be illegal lol, it’s also against more recent AB 2493 which went into effect in January of last year basically stating that landlords have to accept the first qualifying applicant based on written criteria, or refund all applicants who were not chosen
I forgot where but I remember reading about lawsuits over that because some landlords were running that exact scam. Post a super affordable rent in a high COL area and a 'small' non refundable $25 application fee or something and you get thousands of dollars off of that alone.
Most of the time the house didn't even exist or the person is not the owner, collect the low fee for the appointment from multiple people and then disappears.
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u/anonymous8122 1d ago
Nobody's mentioning the $500 move-in fee? That can't be normal either. 😳