Fair Housing Law Basics for Real Estate Agents
by Janet Wickell
from http://about.com/

Advertising Issues to Comply with Fair Housing
US real estate agents deal with Fair Housing issues every day. One important brush with Fair Housing laws takes place when we write ads that we hope will convice home buyers to call about our listings.
If you flip through any real estate for sale magazine, you will find ads that technically break--or at least bend--Fair Housing laws. Agents don't intentionally write bad ads, they typically just don't stop to think about what they are saying.

Extreme PCishness in Real Estate Ads
A few years ago a flyer circulated among agents in our area, warning us that using the term master bedroom could be a violation of Fair Housing laws, because it attempted to say who would sleep in the room. Another term we were cautioned about was great view, since it might suggest a blind person would not be welcome to inspect the property.

Agents were unhappy, because both of those features are important ones that certainly want to convey to buyers--and frankly, the caution seemed to stretch political corectness to its limits.

Fortunately, some of the paranoia about common terminology has died down, leaving us with a more common sense approach to writing ads, but every real estate agent must still stop and think about what they are saying to the public.Here are a few examples

What's wrong with these ads?
3 bedroom, 2 bath family home in great neighborhood

The word family should be eliminated, since it could convey the idea that the home is only appropriate for buyers with families. The term great neighborhood is fine. It describes the qualities of the area, and not the people who live there.

3 bedroom, 2 bath home, perfect for a mature couple

Mature couple makes reference to the type of people the agent feels would be suited to live in the house. It's not up to us to make that determination. (If it's a seniors only community, that fact can and should be revealed.)

3 bedroom, 2 bath home with family room on lower level

Family room is a commonly used term that wouldn't likely be questioned, but if you want to be cautious, change it to recreation room. Along the same lines, a bachelor condo could be called an efficiency condo.

Two Fair Housing Advertising Tips

Rule #1: Your ads should describe only the property, not the type of person who you feel should live there.

Rule #2: Do not use terms that refer to race, color, national origin, religious preference, sex, familial status, or handicaps.