As with all things these days, real estate and rental are at their most efficient when piping hot through the digital marketplace. Whether you’re listing rental properties, searching for an apartment, or managing a lease agreement, everything you need to know is but a click away. Unfortunately, in the heat of the search, it’s easy to forget that not everything you see on Craigslist is legally binding-and that goes double when it comes to the often-thorny relationship between disability and housing.

As something of a legal grey-area, the regulations surrounding emotional support animals in Minnesota have been in continuous flux. As such, it is a particularly interesting area for digital market places looking to facilitate home rentals-especially with regard to the addition of emotional support animals on housing applications. Here’s what you need to know about the current state of emotional support animal regulations, and how the WPDM Marketplace can help ensure that your furry friends don’t land you in hot water.

As the name suggests, a housing-related “emotional support animal” (ESA) is a pet with a letter of certification from a qualified medical doctor attesting to the claim that they provide critical emotional support to a tenant or homebuyer. In this regard ESAs differ from traditional service animals, who are often specially trained to assist with tasks like sight, hearing, or basic movement.

Update: As of 2018, all requests for an emotional support animal in the state of Minnesota are considered accepted. According to mylegalaid.org, “you do not have to tell your landlord why you need an emotional support animal.” However, the catch is that you need to get ESA authentication from a certified medical practitioner. This could be your primary care doctor, psychiatrist, psychologist, or a mental health professional with expertise in your area of disability. Keeping your verification letter on file will help avoid conflict with landlords or managerial staff over your pet’s presence.

In practice, emotional support animal housing laws (and their more evolved older brother, disability protection) are complex and fraught with exceptions. By and large, it is illegal to discriminate against someone requesting housing based on their disability. However, allowing a tenant to have a pet, or in this case emotional support animal, requires added responsibility on the part of the landlord. Animal damage, allergies and so on can cause issues down the line, so landlords have right to request that tenants (or home-buyers) provide authenticated documentation of their need for the pet.

In this way, while ESAs are undeniably useful for countless people across the state, they cannot be feigned (or randomly added to an application) without risk of legal action.

Fortunately, digital documentation platforms like the WPDM Marketplace can be incredibly useful for determining who requires an ESA, and who is simply jumping on the bandwagon. A simple document request or download export can help facilitate the legal process, allowing tenants to upload their anticipated ESA authentication for your review, and eliminating the paper trail that comes with most at-home printers.

In general, compliance with minnesota emotional support animal housing laws requires that you either permission to have an ESA, or documentation of emotional support. The first can be particularly tricky to ascertain if you do not routinely work with patients. However, working through a digital marketplace allows you to easily connect with local physicians specializing in one reason or another. Whether you intentionally provide handy access or require a formal request for verification, WPDM digital platforms can help you capitalize on user accessibility.

As with any other area of the real estate marketplace, understanding your rights and responsibilities is critical when it comes to managing emotional support animals. When certified medical professionals go out of their way to provide proof per a tenant request, it’s generally best to accept the ESA and avoid mitigating conflict. That said, many landlords are too busy (or otherwise unable) to weed out legitimate ESA requests from malicious ones-whereas WPDM marketplace managers can easily facilitate uploads and downloads required for emotional support participation.

Contrary to what you might think, simply applying for an ESA does not mean that you are guaranteed to receive it; nor does it mean that you really need it. For example, knowingly falsifying ESA requests could lead to disciplinary action from the Medical Board, or even suspension of your ESA status. Some landlords could even look to legal action against you for special requests.

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