Discriminatory practices persist in real estate.
This is the conclusion drawn by the association SOS Racisme, after a new survey carried out among 136 real estate agencies in several cities in France.
According to the results of this testing revealed by FranceInfo, 48.5% of these agencies meet the discriminatory requirements of the owners whose accommodation they manage.
In concrete terms, activists from SOS Racisme contacted 136 agencies by telephone pretending to be landlords with discriminatory demands on their future tenant.
Result: while they would meet all the solvency conditions, people of sub-Saharan or North African origin "have a one in two chance of contacting an agency that would agree to practice or allow practice of discrimination against them", deplores SOS Racisme.
"We don't have the right to do it but..."
In detail, one agency out of four refuses to make the selection itself but lets the owner choose his future tenants by not retaining "the so-called Arab or black profiles in order to avoid neighborhood problems
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This sample represents 32 agencies out of 136.
Another finding is that one out of four agencies agrees to directly select potential tenants on the basis of a racially discriminatory criterion, with 34 out of 136 agencies. the selection of my appointments", recognizes a director of a real estate agency, contacted by an activist.
According to the results of the survey, one agency out of two refuses to make a selection on the basis of a racially discriminatory criterion, i.e. 70 agencies out of 136. All the agencies included in the sample belong to the FNAIM network, but also at Century 21, Guy Hocquet, Stéphane Plaza or even Orpi.
Read alsoHousing and racism: a year of investigation into discrimination
The situation here does not differ from that observed three years ago.
Already in 2019, SOS Racisme had carried out a similar survey of real estate agencies located in Île-de-France.
51% of them then accepted the discriminatory demands of the owner, or became accomplices.
Thus, some agencies pinned today were already pinned during the 2019 testing.
Faced with this observation, SOS Racisme calls for various measures, including: a "strengthening of criminal sanctions in the event of discrimination", but also the "implementation of a disciplinary order" by restoring "the disciplinary function of the National Council for the transaction and property management, abolished by the Elan law of 2018
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