HB4768, The Landlord Retaliation Act, is working its way through the General Assembly.

The purpose for the legislation is to prevent a landlord from retaliating against a tenant who complains about property conditions. That behavior is already prohibited by law, but the advocates of this bill feel the existing law doesn’t sufficiently punish landlords.

Among a list of triggering actions, the new version states that if a tenant simply requests a repair then a landlord is prohibited from making management decisions like raising rent, refusing to renew a lease or change any term of service for one year after that request is made.

This is not limited to major maintenance problems. Almost every request for repair could trigger the prohibition. Multiple maintenance requests within a year are not uncommon, so the liability of this bill will often be continuous.

The biggest problem with the bill is a presumption that the landlord is guilty of retaliation if they make any of the prohibited management decisions within the year after the request for maintenance is made.

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