The data showed that 48,50% of 136 real state agencies analyzed agreed to the discriminatory demands made by the apartments´ owners whose rental services they manage, with people of North African or sub-Saharan origin being the most affected, even though they meet all the solvency requirements, SOS Racismo lamented.

Despite the fact that French law prohibits all forms of discrimination, and in the case of renting provides for penalties of up to 3 years in prison and 45,000 euros in fines, 66 agencies out of 136 contacted accepted to select candidates with discriminatory criteria or provided “Arab or black profiles to avoid neighborhood problems”, leaving the landlord to choose his tenants.

Three years ago, a similar test conducted by SOS Racisme in the Paris region showed that 51% of real estate companies accepted discriminatory orders from landlords or were complicit, which for the association “shows that discriminatory practices persist in the real estate sector.”

It therefore called for a “strengthening of criminal sanctions in cases of discrimination” as this is an unacceptable situation since some of the agencies singled out in the report were already singled out during the investigation carried out in 2019 and, at that time, a dialogue was initiated to establish training sessions.

pgh/arm/jcm/acm