State and federal low income programs
Im a recent landlord who inherited a tenant. I get paid directly from the tenant, not the government, there is no low income status on the lease. The tenant is now demanding i get involved in various state and federal low income programs such as winterization and low income heating assistance programs. Do i have to get involved? Im very reluctant.
I think Rhode Island passed a law requiring Landlords to accept Section 8. It would be worth your time to investigate this and get the answer before you make a mistake and open yourself up to a Fair Housing complaint. It looks like you may even qualify for a bonus.
https://www.rihousing.com/land...
It you are not required to accept the voucher, I would make sure you have that in writing from a website or something that you can show your tenant. Then I would get rid of him as soon as possible. I don't deal well with tenants that demand I do something with my property.
My understanding is that the new law, which was added last year, adds "source of income" to the list of protected classes, for which a landlord may not use to determine tenant eligibility. See the "lawful source of income" phrase used in the Rhode Island Fair Housing Practices Act (RIGL 34-37), or here's the bill that passed the changes.
My understanding, and I'm not at attorney, is that it only applies to tenant selection, and wouldn't mandate that you sign up for any government program the tenant demanded. However it could also be said that if the tenant's source of income changed from a job to government assistance, you couldn't evict them for that change since it's still a "lawful source of income".
I don't have the details here so I'm not sure what the tenant's motivations are; it sounds like they're demanding you insulate the property so their heating bill goes down maybe?
It doesn't sound to me like it's a good tenant relationship and when their lease is up you could consider just terminating the lease. The tenant demanding you make improvements to your property, which you disagree with, sounds like a fine and normal reason to end a rental relationship, regardless of where some/all of the funds for the improvements would come from.
Also, some of the government funding type property improvement programs come with some serious strings, like restrictions on how much rent you can charge for X number of years going forward. If you do decide to look into any of those programs, be sure to read all the fine print.
@Mike K. The programs you are talking about subsidize the tenants heat and weatherization of the property. The heat program costs you nothing. They qualify based on income. I don't know in RI if you have to provide any information as a LL but I would not stand in the way of a tenant who asked for this. I do not know about weatherization, they may do a free energy assessment like MA and if there are things to be done since the tenant is low income they may subsidize. Good deal for you if it was something you were doing anyway like thermostats. I don't think you have to agree to either but the lower cost utilities is usually a simple form if they run it like MA.
@Mike K. There are plenty of energy assistance programs out there, not sure I see the issue in finding these if it helps the tenant pay you rent. If the tenant wants it that bad, provide the resources and have them do the work. These programs are going to require the tenants personal info anyway.
As a first step I would ask them what exactly they're talking about or where they saw that information (like on a TV ad or online), so at least you can open up communication channels and get a better of idea of what they're actually asking. You might not want the added conversation with your tenant, but in my opinion guessing what they could be talking about and trying to solve that is a waste of your time and resources.