Favoring families over frat boys

Q: For the past three years, we have been renting out our summer cottage for two- or three-day overnight periods to a group of university boys. We were given their Greek name, which we interpreted to be a Greek honorary group. This is a relatively new fraternity and when we began renting to them, we could find little information about them.

During a recent rental, our neighbors became concerned because the boys were conducting some kind of a ritual on our deck involving chanting, robes and candles (I believe it was a new membership ceremony). We now know that this is a fraternity for gay, homosexual and progressive men.

We are uncomfortable with the activity that goes on when they rent. We do not feel they were totally honest with us about their fraternity when they first started renting. Is it illegal to tell them that our summer home is now only for family vacationers? --Marilyn and Don H.

A: When I began reading your question, I was sure I was going to hear the familiar lament about renting to college kids, particularly fraternity boys: the noise, the parties, the inconsiderate treatment of property and neighbors … behavior not shared by all college renters, to be sure, but common enough. Landlords facing these problems have many remedies, including using lease clauses that make it clear that rowdy behavior and significant property damage will be grounds for termination.

In fact, the answer to your question lies in understanding why the law allows landlords to prohibit these types of activities and behavior. It's the behavior, not the nature of the renters themselves, that landlords may legitimately target as grounds for termination. The landlord has a right to protect his property and has an obligation (to neighbors and the government) to prevent tenants from causing a disturbance or worse. No matter who the renters are, inconsiderate behavior and property damage should result in losing the rental, and it's fine for landlords to enforce these rules.

It's a very different situation if a landlord targets particular types of tenants rather than particular types of behavior. For example, a landlord can get into trouble by refusing to rent to students as a whole -- some cities actually include "matriculation status" as a protected class. In these cities, a landlord who will not rent to students is a candidate for a discrimination lawsuit, as much as if he'd said, "No pregnant women" or "No blacks."

You write that you're not "comfortable" with the "activity that goes on." Does this mean that the deck activities observed by your neighbor are not consistent with your good-tenant standards, which you'd disapprove of no matter who performed them? Would you be equally concerned if this were a heterosexual fraternity? If so, you are certainly entitled to tell your university renters that their outdoors activities are disturbing the neighbors, and they should cool it or at least move indoors.

But you also say that your preference would be to rent only to families. Your solution suggests that your real beef is with the nature of the renters themselves, regardless of their initiation activities. And here is where things can get tricky.

To refuse to rent to a group comprised of gay men, simply because they're gay, would indeed be illegal discrimination in some states and cities. Many states -- including California, Connecticut, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New Jersey, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Oregon, Utah, Vermont, Wisconsin, and even Washington, D.C. -- extend such protection. And even in states that don't, some cities within those states have passed their own protective ordinances, including Atlanta, Chicago, Detroit, Miami, New York, Pittsburgh, St. Louis and Seattle (for more information, check out lambdalegal.org). ...CONTINUED

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