A Jacksonville property management company has agreed to settle a class-action lawsuit filed on behalf of Black housing applicants alleging that the defendants’ tenant-screening process discriminated against prospective renters.
JWB Property Management and a related entity, JWB Real Estate Capital, agreed to a settlement in a federal lawsuit filed last year in the Middle District of Florida. Black housing applicants alleged that the company’s screening process was not an accurate indicator of tenant worthiness and that the company’s actions discriminated against Black rental applicants in the Jacksonville area.
“At JWB and JWB Capital’s direction and request, when someone applies to rent from either defendant, or from defendants collectively, SafeRent or another tenant-screening company compiles and reports the mere existence of eviction filing … against rental applicants to JWB and JWB Capital without regard to the correctness of the filing or the case disposition,” the lawsuit filed in November of last year states.
The settlement, which was negotiated between JWB and Jacksonville Area Legal Aid (JALA), resolves the plaintiffs’ claims that considering applications based only on the existence of eviction filings instead of the outcome of eviction cases represented a violation of the federal Fair Housing Act, according to a statement JALA emailed to the Florida Record.
“In the negotiated settlement, JWB voluntarily agreed to alter its application process and the information provided on its websites to clarify that tenants with eviction filings can apply for tenancy with JWB and all applicants will be assessed on a case-by-case, individualized basis,” the statement says.
The agreement stresses that no finding of race discrimination against JWB has been made in the litigation. The plaintiffs’ attorney, Suzanne Garrow, commended JWB’s decision to not deny tenant applications based on the existence of eviction filings alone.
“The focus of any assessment of tenant worthiness when reviewing an application for tenancy should be on the current ability of the applicant to pay rent and adhere to the terms and obligations of the lease,” Garrow said in a prepared statement.
JWB’s founder, Alex Sifakis, said that its employees work hard to assess each applicant’s individual situation.
“JWB continues to be a leading provider of affordable housing options across northeast Florida, and we are thankful for the opportunity to move forward positively to continue to serve our community,” Sifakis said.
The lawsuit cited a November 2022 report from the federal Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) that found the use of eviction histories in tenant screening was problematic. About 22% of eviction court records contained errors or misleading or ambiguous information, the complaint states.
Reports of evictions may not reflect final court rulings or situations such as landlords retaliating against tenants who stand up for their legal rights or tenants who demand that certain repairs be made or eviction cases that were dismissed, according to the CFPB report.
“In addition, eviction histories reported by tenant-screening ‘consumer reporting agencies’ such as SafeRent routinely include information that is inaccurate, outdated or that belongs to someone other than the subject of the screening report,” the lawsuit stated.
Properties owned or operated by the defendants are in regions of Duval County that have higher Black populations than the county as a whole, according to the complaint.