Action Alerts on Tenant Credit Checks and the Transfer Tax
During the past month, SPOA alerted its constituents about two harmful proposals concerning tenant credit check restrictions and the transfer tax proposal that will be considered by the Massachusetts legislature soon. Please read the notices below and take action by contacting your state legislators.
Tenant Credit Check Restriction
April 16, 2024
There is an unrealistic new bill, H1308, under consideration at the state house rapidly moving forward to become law. This bill essentially bans the use of credit checks and would potentially create serious legal liability for small property owners who rely on credit reports when screening prospective tenants.
Under this proposal, any property owner, who used a credit report to make an adverse decision about a prospective tenant, would be required to disclose the information that was the basis for the decision to the tenant 14 days prior to the rejection -- and provide the tenant an opportunity to dispute the rejection with the credit agencies before a final rejection.
This bill will turn a simple, routine credit check into an endless quagmire fraught with legal danger and long delays before a unit could be rented. And if that is not bad enough, a property owner who fails to comply with any part of this bill would be subject to Chapter 93A violations with triple damages.
As crazy as this sounds, this bill has already been approved by two key committees and is at its last stop, the Committee for 3rd Reading, before advancing to the full House for a vote.
PLEASE CONTACT YOUR STATE REPRESENTATIVES TODAY TO TELL THEM HOW OUTRAGEOUS THIS BILL IS! You can find your representatives by using the link below.
Sponsored by Rep. Manny Cruz (7th Essex District -- Salem) and Rep. Judith Garcia (11th Suffolk District -- Everett, Chelsea), the bill itself can be found in the link below.
When contacting your representatives, you can tell them the following:
1) What kind of message are we giving to property owners? Seal eviction records, effectively ban credit reports, just rent to anyone with no questions asked, and make it more difficult to remove noncompliant tenants. Is this really fair, safe, or sustainable for all the hard-working business owners who put their savings on the line to provide others with housing?
2) This bill puts property owners in a no-win situation by threatening their businesses, while punishing them for making sure that a prospective tenant can pay the rent.
3) The bill also sets up tenants for difficulty down the road if they can't pay the rent.
4) At a time when we need more housing, this bill will drive property owners away, further depleting the available rental housing stock, while driving rents up.
5) Obstructing owners from making informed decisions places both owners and tenants at risk, along with the properties themselves.
6) Government should seek an even playing field for both owners and tenants, instead of hampering these relationships to the peril of both stakeholders and the housing itself.
PLEASE CONTACT YOUR STATE REPRESENTATIVES TODAY TO VOICE OPPOSITION TO THIS DANGEROUS BILL!
Transfer Tax Proposal
April 23, 2024
Governor Healey has proposed a major housing package which is about to be debated at the State House. SPOA has been following this bill since it was first introduced and has testified before the Housing Committee. While there are parts of the bill we support like zoning relief to create more accessory apartments, there was one section we made clear that we STRONGLY oppose, allowing communities to implement new transfer taxes on the sale of property.
No one has yet explained to us how taxing the sale of a home, investment property, or commercial property will lower the cost of housing and lead to more housing supply. Rather, transfer taxes make housing more costly for both sellers and buyers, while further depleting the available rental housing stock in the Commonwealth, thereby increasing rents and operating costs further.
As a small property owner, a transfer tax will have even more direct impact. After all, we are in the business of owning and managing property. Most of us don’t consider ourselves millionaires, but we may look like one for tax purposes the year we sell a property. Not only will we be hit by the state's new 4% surtax on incomes over 1 million, but now if communities like Boston, Cambridge, Brookline, and a couple of dozen others get their way, you could be paying a net tax of up to 2% on the sale.
Our friends at the Massachusetts Association of Realtors have spelled out this issue in more detail. The attached letter in the link below contains a thorough explanation as to why this plan should be rejected.
Please contact your state legislators to oppose this measure. We expect a vote in the House and Senate in the coming weeks.
As the letter says, please tell your legislators that we must pursue policies that create more housing and affordability in our state, instead of implementing taxes that will decrease competition and restrict the housing market further.
You can find your state representatives and senators by using the link below
You can also use the petition link below from our friends at the Greater Boston Real Estate Board.
by Amir Shahsavari
