Three Ways to File — Pick the One That's Easiest for You
You can report housing discrimination to HUD's Office of Fair Housing and Equal Opportunity (FHEO) in whichever of these three ways works best for you:
- Online — HUD has an online complaint form you can submit yourself
- Phone — call an FHEO intake specialist at 1-800-669-9777
- Mail — print HUD's complaint form and mail it to your regional FHEO office
There's no cost to file, and you don't need a lawyer to do it. Some states and cities also have their own fair housing agency that investigates the same kind of complaint under a similar local law — filing with HUD or with a state/local agency that has a "substantially equivalent" fair housing law generally has the same effect, since HUD refers complaints to those agencies when appropriate.
What to Have Ready Before You Start
Whichever way you file, have this information ready:
- Your name and address
- The name and address of the person or company you're filing against
- The address of the housing or program involved
- A short description of what happened
- The date, or date range, of the incident
The more specific you can be about dates, what was said, and who was involved, the easier it is for an investigator to act on your complaint. Save texts, emails, the listing itself, and any notes you wrote down close to when it happened — memory fades, and a contemporaneous note carries more weight later.
The Deadline You Cannot Miss
You have one year from the date the discrimination happened, or ended if it was ongoing, to file a complaint with HUD. This deadline is set by the Fair Housing Act itself, not by HUD policy, so there's no discretion to extend it after the fact. If you think you've experienced discrimination, don't wait to see how things play out — file first and sort out the details afterward if you need to.
If you'd rather go straight to court instead of filing an administrative complaint, you have a separate, longer deadline: two years from the date the discrimination happened or ended to file a private lawsuit. You can sue whether or not you also filed a HUD complaint, and filing with HUD doesn't use up your right to sue later — though the clock on your two years pauses while HUD's own investigation is pending. If HUD or a state agency helped you reach a settlement (called a conciliation agreement) with your landlord, you generally give up the right to sue over that specific incident, except to enforce the settlement itself.
What Happens After You File
Once you file with HUD, they'll send you written notice confirming they received your complaint and explaining your options and deadlines. HUD (or the state or local agency handling it) then investigates — interviewing you, the landlord, and any witnesses, and reviewing records like the rental application, lease, and any advertising. If HUD finds reasonable cause to believe discrimination occurred, it issues a formal charge, and the case can go to a hearing or to federal court. Many complaints resolve earlier than that, through a conciliation agreement between you and the landlord.
Filing Doesn't Give Your Landlord a Free Pass to Retaliate
The Fair Housing Act separately makes it unlawful to "coerce, intimidate, threaten, or interfere with" someone for exercising a fair housing right, including the right to file a complaint. A landlord who raises your rent, tries to evict you, or reduces services because you filed is opening themselves up to a second, separate violation on top of the original one. If that happens, document it the same way — dates, what was said, what changed — and mention it when you talk to your HUD investigator or a tenant rights attorney; it can be folded into the same case or raised on its own.
Protect Your Case While You Wait
A complaint can take months to resolve, and in the meantime you may still be living in — or looking for — housing from the same landlord or property manager. Keep every piece of documentation, and don't destroy or lose texts, emails, or paperwork related to the incident, even ones that seem unimportant now.
If the discrimination shows up in specific lease terms — different rules, different fees, or a clause that singles out certain tenants — Honestkey™ can read an uploaded lease and flag clauses or fees that may not hold up under your state's law, which can help you document exactly what you're dealing with before you file.