Fair Housing and Equal Opportunity Policy

Protected classes and local scope

CREN should treat fair-housing compliance as a product, editorial, advertising, and data-design requirement. Federal law bars discrimination in housing because of race, color, national origin, religion, sex, familial status, and disability. Ohio and Columbus add additional protected classes and local obligations that must be reflected in housing-related workflows.

Banned uses

• No housing ad, profile, search tool, lead route, ranking, filter, article, or sponsor placement may state or imply unlawful preference, limitation, exclusion, steering, or discouragement.
• Do not target or suppress housing opportunities by protected class.
• Do not describe neighborhoods as best or not best for protected groups.
• Do not tie protected-class demographic changes to property values, school quality, safety, crime, or neighborhood desirability.

Safer content pattern

• Use objective, source-labeled facts: rent, sale price, inventory, commute, transit, permits, zoning, taxes, public amenities, and property features.
• Use user-selected preferences that are not protected-class proxies: budget, bedrooms, pet policy, parking, commute anchor, lease timing, accessibility features requested by the user, and property type.
• Require manual review for apartment, lender, agent, school, safety, ranking, and neighborhood-comparison copy.

Advertiser certification

Housing-related advertisers, profile owners, and listing submitters should certify that their copy, targeting, screening, application, pricing, and lead-handling practices comply with applicable fair-housing law. CREN should preserve certification version and timestamp before paid placement.