Religion

Fair housing laws provide protection from discrimination due to religion in all types of housing transactions and/or services. Housing discrimination due to religion may take many forms including the following examples:

• Refusing to rent to women who wear hijabs (religious headscarves) or Sikhs who wear turbans.
• Harassing tenants because of their religious practices or dress.
• Calling Muslims “terrorists” and telling them they aren’t welcome as tenants or neighbors.
• Allowing some tenants to put up Christmas lights, but telling others they cannot put up decorations for their non-Christian
  holidays.
• Telling tenant applicants that they won’t like a neighborhood because there isn’t a mosque, synagogue, or church nearby.
• Prohibiting the use of a community room for religious purposes, while allowing tenants to use them for secular gatherings, such as parties.

FHCCI Resources:

• FHCCI Fact Sheet #14: Hate Crimes, Religious Discrimination, and Fair Housing
  • English
  • Spanish

Government Guidance & Resources:

• HUD Fact Sheet: Housing Provider Obligations to Prevent and Address Religious Discrimination in HUD-Assisted Housing, January 2025
• HUD Final Rule on Partnerships With Faith-Based and Neighborhood Organizations, March 4, 2024
• HUD Fact Sheet: Protecting Persons from Housing Discrimination Based on Actual or Perceived Shared Ancestry or Ethnic Characteristics, September 23, 2023
• Ensuring Fair Housing Amidst Ongoing Religious Discrimination in the United States, May 25, 2023
• HUD Fact Sheet: Preventing and Addressing Harassment in Housing, May 4, 2020
• HUD Final Rule Extending Religious Liberty Protections to Beneficiaries of HUD Programs and Activities, March 31, 2016
• Substantive and Procedural Limitations on Filing and Investigating Fair Housing Act Complaints That May Implicate the First Amendment, HUD, May 26, 2015
• Substantive and Procedural Limitations on Filing and Investigating Fair Housing Act Complaints That May Implicate the First Amendment, HUD, May 1, 2004
• HUD Memo on Displaying of Religious Items, December 20, 2001
• HUD Memo on Advertising, January 9, 1995 (commonly called the Achtenberg Memo)

Other Information of Interest:

• The Fair Housing Act and Religious Freedom, Michael P. Seng, 2005.