Compliance

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Many owners and managers are afraid to reject applicants who are protected by fair housing laws—even if those applicants aren’t qualified to live at their site. Owners and managers worry that if an applicant accuses them of discrimination, they’ll be stuck paying steep fines and penalties.

The Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act (CARES Act), signed into law on March 27, 2020, includes important, immediate protections for tenants. Specifically, it mandates a 120-day eviction moratorium for tenants living in certain types of properties.

HUD recently issued new guidelines relating to assistance animals under the Fair Housing Act (FHA). Notice FHEO-2020-01, referred to as the “Assistance Animals Notice,” replaces prior HUD guidelines from 2013 and can be found at www.hud.gov/sites/dfiles/PA/documents/HUDAsstAnimalNC1-28-2020.pdf.

Every tax credit site must meet and maintain a minimum set-aside throughout a 15-year compliance period to qualify for the tax credit program. A minimum set-aside is the federally required minimum level of tax credit units at a site. To meet the set-aside, you must rent a certain percentage of the units in your building or site to qualified low-income households.

Fair housing compliance is key to successful tax credit management. Here are five online resources for you to check out. Each site offers a product, service, or activity that can help you better understand what you must do to avoid illegally discriminating against applicants and residents at your tax credit site. We’ll tell you why they’re helpful and what to expect when you visit.

The IRS Office of Chief Counsel recently issued a memorandum addressing noncompliance of common areas in LIHTC sites. The memo was issued in response to a clarification request by an IRS Program Manager for Technical Issues. The memo states that its advice may not be used or cited as precedent, but it illuminates how the IRS will approach noncompliance of a common area.

As a tax credit owner or manager, you should familiarize yourself with key documents to help you manage your tax credit site. To make it easy for you to get these documents, we’ll discuss five useful documents you can download from the Internet. We’ll tell you about each document and where you can download it. These documents are either required reading to meet the tax credit program’s requirements or helpful in improving your compliance efforts and running your site more efficiently. Here’s a rundown on each document and where to find it online.

Placing a building in service—that is, making it functional within the tax credit program—can be tricky if you’re not sure what’s required and what your options are. And knowing how to place a building in service is important because it affects when your building’s owner can begin claiming its credits.

Here are four tips to follow when placing your building in service. Go over these tips with the owner. That way, you can make sure the owner can claim the tax credits it was allocated for your building.

If you violate the federal tax credit law and don’t promptly correct the noncompliance, the owner may lose tax credits. Item 11 on IRS Form 8823 (Low-Income Housing Credit Agencies Report of Noncompliance or Building Disposition), which is the form the state housing agency uses to report noncompliance to the IRS, lists the main ways you can violate the tax credit law. These federal violations are sometimes called IRS violations.

When you place ads to fill vacancies or waiting lists at your tax credit site, what those ads say or how they depict your site can greatly influence who responds. For this reason, fair housing advocacy groups pay close attention to ads for rental housing. If you say or depict the wrong thing, you could find yourself the target of a lawsuit or HUD enforcement action. And if your state housing agency discovers a fair housing violation, it must report you to the IRS for noncompliance.