Tenant Screening and Fair Housing in the Information Age Anna C. Reosti
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Tenant Screening and Fair Housing in the Information Age Anna C. Reosti A dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy University of Washington 2018 Reading Committee: Katherine Beckett, Chair Kyle Crowder Stewart Tolnay Program Authorized to Offer Degree: Sociology i © Copyright 2018 Anna C. Reosti ii University of Washington Abstract Tenant Screening and Fair Housing in the Information Age Anna C. Reosti Chair of the Supervisory Committee: Professor Katherine Beckett Department of Sociology The information age has brought about an unprecedented level of scrutiny with which applicants for rental housing are evaluated. Contemporary landlords are increasingly likely to use commercial background check tools to investigate applicants’ criminal, credit and eviction histories. In addition to impeding housing access for renters with imperfect tenancy, credit or criminal records, these technologies may enhance opportunities for subtle forms of discrimination involving the inconsistent application of background check criteria. This dissertation uses a mixed-methods approach to investigate how rental housing providers screen and select applicants on the basis of discrediting information revealed by background checks. It also assesses the capacity of existing and proposed fair housing regulations to combat discriminatory tenant screening practices and broaden housing access for renters with negative background credentials. The project’s online field experiment measures how landlords respond to emails from fictitious prospective applicants disclosing two types of iii negative rental credentials (criminal history and prior eviction), and whether those response patterns are related to the race of applicants. The project’s qualitative component entails forty-six in-depth interviews with representatives of Seattle’s rental housing industry as well as renters with criminal conviction records, past evictions and/or damaged credit histories who had recently searched for housing. The interviews construct a rich descriptive picture of the tenant-screening process from divergent vantage points, explore the impact of fair housing law on how landlords approach background screening, and document the far-reaching consequences of modern tenant screening and selection practices for negatively-credentialed renters. This study advances our understanding of how ostensibly race-neutral background screening criteria and technologies can reshape, amplify or conceal existing patterns of discrimination in the private rental market, an increasingly important site of social stratification. My research also provides timely, policy-relevant insights into the distinct challenges involved in using new fair housing regulations to combat discriminatory tenant screening practices and meaningfully broaden housing access for renters with discrediting background credentials. iv TABLE OF CONTENTS List of Figures ................................................................................................................................ vi List of Tables ................................................................................................................................ vii Acknowledgements ...................................................................................................................... viii Chapter 1. Introduction ....................................................................................................................1 Chapter 2. “We Totally go Subjective”: Discretion, Bias and Benevolence in Tenant Screening ..........................................................................................................................................................7 Chapter 3. Housing Search Experiences of Negatively Credentialed Renters ..............................46 Chapter 4. Race and Negative Credentialism in the Private Rental Market: An Experimental Investigation ...................................................................................................................................82 Chapter 5: Conclusion..................................................................................................................123 Appendix A: Supplemental Findings from Online Field Experiment ........................................136 Appendix B: Email Script Components for Online Field Experiment .......................................142 Appendix C: Racially Distinctive Names for Online Field Experiment .....................................146 Appendix D: Online Field Experiment Research Sites ...............................................................147 Appendix E: Qualtrics Email Coding Protocol ...........................................................................150 References ....................................................................................................................................170 v LIST OF FIGURES Figure 4.1. Email Messages Sent by Date ..................................................................................104 Figure 4.2. Rate of Email Response by Tester ............................................................................106 Figure 4.3. Rate of Invitation to View Unit by Tester ................................................................110 vi LIST OF TABLES Table 3.1. Renter Respondent Characteristics ...............................................................................54 Table 4.1. Treatment/Control Ratio in Email Response Rates ....................................................107 Table 4.2 Black/White Ratio in Email Response Rates ..............................................................108 Table 4.3. Treatment/Control Ratio in Email Invitation Rates ....................................................110 Table 4.4. Black/White Ratio in Email Invitation Rates .............................................................111 Table 4.5. Responses to Negatively Credentialed Renters ..........................................................114 Table 4.6. Examples Responses to Inquiries from Negatively Credentialed Testers .................116 vii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This research has been supported by the UW Otto Larsen Dissertation Award, the UW Graduate School Presidential Dissertation Fellowship, the West Coast Poverty Center Dissertation Fellowship and a National Science Foundation Dissertation Improvement Grant. The West Coast Poverty Center, and Shannon Harper in particular, has been an important source of support for my dissertation project since its inception. Many thanks to my dissertation committee, Katherine Beckett, Kyle Crowder, Alexes Harris, George Lovell and Stew Tolnay, who have offered tremendous intellectual, professional and personal support throughout this process. Katherine and Alexes, who also co-chaired my Masters’ Thesis committee, shaped my academic trajectory in important ways early in my graduate career by modeling what public sociology looks like. I owe a great debt to my chair, Katherine, for her years of unfailing guidance and support and for always treating me like an intellectual peer. Thank you to Sara Chasins, Valentina Staneva and Kathleen Moore, all of whom provided crucial assistance with the technical components of my research. Merf Ehman also provided essential help with interview subject recruitment. I have benefitted enormously over the years from the members of various graduate student working groups who have offered important feedback on my work and kept my spirits afloat throughout the process: Emily, Annie, Marco, Heather, Lindsey, Issa, Andre, Ursula, Michele, Tiffany, Walid, Thiago and Tim. A special thank you to those whose friendship has offered a much needed diversion from the trials of graduate school: Sara, Joe, Stacey, Jordan, Jason, Mark, Abby, Eileen and Xioban, and especially to Lee, who has made this final and most grueling year of graduate school the best one to date. Thank you to my parents and siblings for their love, emotional support, intellectual curiosity and for not asking too many questions about when I would finish graduate school. Finally, thank you to my sister and unpaid editor, Elizabeth, without whom this dissertation would not exist. viii Chapter 1: Introduction “It’s a racket. It’s unregulated – there’s no government overseeing it, or there’s no state overseeing it…Racism and discrimination is so complex today. It’s not as obvious as it was in the sixties. Today we hide behind things like criterias.” - David In 2012, a campaign led by a coalition of civil rights and housing advocates in Seattle to dismantle barriers to employment and housing for people with criminal records had finally harnessed the attention of local policymakers. Out of those organizing efforts came Seattle’s 2013 “Jobs Assistance Legislation” ordinance, which created new rules for how private employers in the city screen applicants for criminal histories. That coalition continued to push for legislation regulating criminal background screening in housing, and four years later the Seattle City Council passed the “Fair Chance Housing Ordinance,” which prohibits private landlords from inquiring about rental applicants’ criminal histories or performing criminal background checks in most circumstances. The initial motivation for this study can be traced to the lessons and questions that emerged from Clean Slate, a 2012 research project designed to inform local policy discussions around regulating criminal background screening practices