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When looking for a place to call home, discrimination based on your race, color, national origin, religion, sex, disability, or familial status (which includes children under the age of 18 living with parents or legal custodians, pregnant women, and people in the process of getting custody of children under the age of 18) is against the law.

If you feel your housing rights have been violated, you have up to one year to file a complaint with us.

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We work with agencies around the country that provide assistance to victims of housing discrimination. You can also contact these agencies for help.

The Fair Housing Assistance Program (FHAP) helps state and local agencies to create and enforce fair housing laws similar (or substantially equivalent) to the Fair Housing Act.

The Fair Housing Initiatives Program (FHIP) funds agencies that can help you. These non-profit fair housing organizations develop programs designed to prevent or eliminate discriminatory housing practices. They also conduct preliminary investigations of housing discrimination claims, including sending "testers" (minorities and whites with the same financial qualifications who evaluate whether housing providers treat equally-qualified people differently) to properties suspected of practicing housing discrimination.