The first reply isn't a malfunction. The assistant was handed the pet policy and applied it, weight limit and fees included, to an animal the policy doesn't cover. The difference between the two replies is what it was told to hand off. An AI leasing assistant will answer at two in the afternoon and two in the morning, to every prospect who writes in, in exactly the words it was given. That cuts both ways, and this guide is about making it cut the right way.
Why AI can help here
A busy leasing team answers forty inquiries in forty slightly different ways. One agent mentions the concession, another doesn't. One prospect hears back in ten minutes, another waits two days because their email landed on a Friday afternoon. None of it is malicious, and all of it is inconsistency. Inconsistency is where fair housing risk hides, because two prospects treated differently is the whole complaint.
An assistant that answers from your written policies gives every prospect the same answer, in the same words, in minutes. On that one dimension it isn't a lesser version of a leasing agent. It's a more consistent one.
Four more conversations
Text, Saturday 8:15 a.m.do you take section 8? I have a voucher for a 2 bedroom
RiskySorry, we don't participate in the Section 8 program at this property.
SafeYes, we accept housing vouchers. Here are our written screening criteria and the application link, and I can book you a showing this week.
Apartments.com inquiry, Tuesday 6:02 p.m.We're a family of 5 (3 kids). Is the 2 bed big enough or should we look at your 3 beds? How are the schools there?
RiskyFive might be a tight fit in the 2-bedroom. You might like our Camelback building better: it's a family-friendly community near top-rated schools.
SafeOur written occupancy limit for the 2-bedroom is five people, so your household fits, and the 3-bedrooms are listed here too. The school district's site shows school boundaries. Want to see either unit?
Website chat, Thursday 2:40 p.m.The place down the street is doing 6 weeks free. Can you match that or knock something off the deposit?
RiskyI can offer $200 off the deposit if you sign a lease this week.
SafeThe current special on this unit is in the listing. Matching another offer or changing a deposit is a decision for our leasing team, so I've passed your question on, and someone will get back to you today.
Zillow inquiry, Sunday 11:20 a.m.I use a wheelchair. Is there a step at the front door of the unit? Would you be able to put in a ramp?
RiskyThere's one step at the entry. Unfortunately, we aren't able to make modifications to the building.
SafeThere's one step at the entry. A ramp is a request for a reasonable modification, so I've passed it to our team, and someone will follow up with you directly today.
Do this
- Answer only from what's written: the listing, the pet policy, the fees, the screening criteria, the occupancy limit. If it isn't written down, the assistant says a person will follow up, and a person does.
- Read the old listings before the assistant does. A “no Section 8” line from a few years ago now breaks Phoenix's fair housing code for units inside city limits, and the assistant will repeat it as faithfully as everything else. Have your attorney check how your income rule applies to a voucher holder's share of the rent, too.
- Send everyone the same criteria and the same application link.
- Treat assistance animals as not pets, and send those requests, and any accessibility request, to a person. They're accommodation or modification requests with legal weight, and an assistance animal doesn't pay a pet deposit, pet fee or pet rent (HUD notice FHEO-2020-01, January 2020).
- Book showings, and answer availability, pricing and move-in dates from the listing.
- Log every conversation, so you can show what was said to whom.
- Before it talks to a prospect, run the four conversations above past it, and your own hardest ones. If it gets one wrong, fix the policy or the instructions, not the reply.
Not that
- Don't ask about, or comment on, protected characteristics. Federally that's race, color, religion, sex, familial status, national origin and disability. Arizona covers the same groups (A.R.S. 41-1491.14, 41-1491.19), and Phoenix adds sexual orientation, gender identity or expression and source of income (City Code ch. 18). The assistant can ask how many people will live in the unit if your occupancy policy needs that. It never asks whether any of them are children.
- Don't steer. Not toward a unit, a building, a floor or a neighborhood, and not with a friendly aside about who lives there.
- Don't make exceptions. Waived deposits, held units and concessions are decisions for a person, applied the same way to everyone.
- Don't screen. Approve-or-deny is made by your team, against your written criteria.
The federal Fair Housing Act applies to what an assistant says exactly as it applies to your staff. Nothing on this page is legal advice.
Who answers what
The assistant answersfrom the written policy, word for word
- “is the 2 bed still available”
- “how much is the pet deposit”
- “can I see it Saturday morning”
- “what do I need to qualify”
- “do you take vouchers”
A person answerswith the conversation attached
- “I have an ESA, is that ok”
- “can you hold it till the 1st”
- “is it a safe area”
- “can you do a month free”
- “I need a ground floor unit, I have a disability”
Notice the shape. The assistant takes the questions that have one written answer. A person takes everything with a decision in it. That's the same line I'd draw in any automation, but here the line is also where the legal exposure sits, so it's worth drawing in pen.
The written policy is the product
Everything above depends on one thing: what you've written down. The assistant can only be as consistent and as careful as your listing, your pet and assistance-animal policy and your screening criteria. If those documents are vague, the assistant will be vague in the same places, to every prospect, in writing.
So before you set one up, have your attorney read those documents. They're what it will repeat, word for word, to every person who asks. That's also the good news. Fixing one policy fixes every conversation at once, which is more than you can say for a leasing team on a busy Saturday.