Equal Access, Equal Service: How Maintenance Practices Can Trigger Fair Housing Complaints

Marketing and Empathy Psychology

By - Doug Chasick, CPM®, CAPS, Adv. RAM, SLE,

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Your maintenance team handles hundreds of requests monthly, but are your practices creating fair housing liability? This critical webinar examines how seemingly routine maintenance decisions—from work order prioritization to repair quality and unit access—can trigger discrimination complaints under the Fair Housing Act.

Learn to identify high-risk scenarios, implement compliant maintenance protocols, and train your team to provide equal service to all residents. Whether you’re a property manager, maintenance supervisor, or regional director, you’ll gain practical strategies to protect your community while delivering exceptional, equitable service. Don’t let maintenance practices become your fair housing blind spot.

Areas Covered:

Why maintenance-related complaints are among the most frequent Fair Housing issues
How inconsistent response times can create the appearance of discrimination
The Fair Housing risks of favoritism, informal exceptions, and verbal agreements
How disparate treatment and disparate impact show up in maintenance operations
What maintenance staff should—and should not—say when interacting with residents
How to fairly prioritize emergency, urgent, and routine maintenance requests
The importance of documentation and how poor record-keeping increases liability
How reasonable accommodations and modifications affect maintenance responsibilities
Best practices for training maintenance teams on Fair Housing without overwhelming them

Learning Objectives:

Explain how maintenance practices intersect with Fair Housing laws and protected classes
Identify common maintenance-related actions that lead to Fair Housing complaints
Recognize the difference between reasonable discretion and discriminatory treatment
Apply consistent standards for maintenance response times and repair prioritization
Improve communication practices to reduce misunderstandings and perceived bias
Implement documentation and oversight strategies that support Fair Housing compliance

Who Should Attend:

Community Manager / Director
Multi-site Manager (Area / Regional)
Leasing Managers
Maintenance Supervisors
Maintenance Technicians
Training Professionals
Compliance Professionals
HR Professionals

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Webinar Type

Clear

Speaker Detail

Doug Chasick, CPM®, CAPS, Adv. RAM, SLE, That Fair Housing Guy™, is the former President of the Fair Housing Institute, Inc. With more than 46 years of investment real estate experience, he began as the Resident Manager of a 524-unit apartment property and has been the President or CEO of five real estate companies, responsible for portfolios of over 28,000 apartments. Doug was awarded his CPM® in 1979 and was a member of the IREM National Faculty for eight years. A Senior Instructor member of the NAAEI Faculty, he leads the Advanced Facilitator Training course, is the co-author of “Outstanding Facilitation Techniques”, and a co-author of the joint IREM & NAAEI “Fair Housing and Beyond” course. He is a licensed Real Estate Broker in Florida, a licensed Expert Fair Housing Instructor in the Commonwealth of Virginia, and the recipient of the NAAEI Apartment Career & Education award.