Two HUD guidance documents addressing assistance animal requests were withdrawn in September 2025.

FHEO 2020-01, the assistance animal notice. FHEO Notice 2013-01, on service and assistance animals. Neither is active guidance.

What matters is what those documents were explaining.

24 CFR 100.204 is the reasonable accommodation regulation. It has two illustrative examples. Example (1) reads:

"A blind applicant for rental housing wants live in a dwelling unit with a seeing eye dog. The building has a no pets policy. It is a violation of § 100.204 for the owner or manager of the apartment complex to refuse to permit the applicant to live in the apartment with a seeing eye dog because, without the seeing eye dog, the blind person will not have an equal opportunity to use and enjoy a dwelling."

An assistance animal under a no-pets policy is the regulation's own first illustration of a reasonable accommodation. It was not withdrawn, and nothing about the withdrawals touched it.

What Actually Changed, And What Did Not

Withdrawn: FHEO 2020-01 and FHEO Notice 2013-01, effective 17 September 2025. Those documents addressed readily apparent disabilities and needs, documentation, unique animals and other practical questions that housing providers used the guidance to navigate.

Not withdrawn: the Fair Housing Act itself. 24 CFR 100.204 and its seeing eye dog example. The 2004 HUD and DOJ Joint Statement on Reasonable Accommodations, which remains publicly available as technical assistance. Section 504 for federally assisted housing. And state and local assistance animal laws, which were not withdrawn by HUD's September 2025 action and may impose additional requirements.

So the underlying legal framework remains. The two HUD guidance documents that addressed how to apply it were withdrawn.

That distinction matters commercially, because commentary since the withdrawal has suggested providers may now charge pet fees for assistance animals. That reasoning does not hold, and the reason is below.

The Distinction That Still Governs

A pet is an animal kept for companionship or pleasure. Pet policies, pet fees, pet rent and pet deposits apply to pets.

An assistance animal is an animal needed because of a disability, whether because it performs work or tasks for the person or because it provides disability-related support. That description is not a current statutory or regulatory definition under the Fair Housing Act. The withdrawn HUD guidance set out a definition along those lines; the operative legal analysis now turns on whether the requested accommodation is necessary because of a disability and whether it is reasonable under the Fair Housing Act, and state law may supply its own definition.

The legal route is the reasonable accommodation obligation. An assistance animal is not simply outside your pet policy. It is an exception to your pet policy made as a reasonable accommodation. Section 100.204 requires reasonable accommodations in rules, policies, practices or services where necessary to afford a person with a disability equal opportunity to use and enjoy a dwelling, and the statutory obligation sits at 42 U.S.C. §3604(f)(3)(B).

Which is why the fee question has to be considered within the accommodation analysis rather than alongside it. If waiving the no-pets policy is the accommodation, the 2004 Joint Statement is direct about what follows.

The Joint Statement states that housing providers may not require persons with disabilities to pay extra fees or deposits as a condition of receiving a reasonable accommodation. Its own example is an applicant with a hearing impairment who needs an assistance animal, and it states that the provider may not require a fee or security deposit as a condition of allowing the animal.

The withdrawal of the two HUD guidance documents did not change that rule or the regulation governing reasonable accommodations.

Damage Is A Different Question

There is a real distinction here, and it is worth stating precisely because operators often get it backwards in both directions.

You may not charge a fee or deposit for the accommodation.

You may charge for damage the animal actually causes, or deduct it from the standard security deposit imposed on all tenants, if it is your practice to assess tenants for damage they cause.

The condition in that last clause is doing the work. If your practice is not to charge tenants for damage they cause, charging here would be inconsistent with that practice. If you do, the assistance animal is treated the same way as any other cause of damage.

What You Can Ask

This is where the withdrawn guidance was most used. The 2004 Joint Statement provides a framework for determining what information may be appropriate when the disability or the disability-related need is not apparent.

Where the disability and the disability-related need are both readily apparent, requesting additional documentation is unlikely to be appropriate. The seeing eye dog in the regulation's example is the paradigm case.

Where the disability is apparent but the need for the animal is not, the provider may request only the information necessary to evaluate the disability-related need. The Joint Statement's example is a wheelchair user requesting an assistance dog under a no-pets policy: the disability is obvious, the reason for the dog is not, and the provider may ask about the disability-related need for the dog.

Where the disability is not apparent, the framework contemplates reliable disability-related information that verifies the person meets the definition of disability, describes the needed accommodation, and shows the relationship between them.

And on who may supply it, the Joint Statement is broader than most verification forms assume. Verification may come from the individual themselves in some circumstances, or from a doctor or other medical professional, a peer support group, a non-medical service agency, or a reliable third party in a position to know about the individual's disability.

In most cases, medical records or detailed information about the nature of the disability are not necessary. That is a general statement rather than an absolute bar, but it is the standard most over-collecting forms fail against.

What The Fair Housing Act Is Not

Two confusions worth separating, because they produce the wrong answers in housing.

The ADA is a different regime. Under the Americans with Disabilities Act, service animal rules for places of public accommodation apply a narrower framework, including limits on what staff may ask. That framework does not govern a housing accommodation request under the Fair Housing Act, and applying ADA-style questioning to a tenancy is a common and consequential error.

Registration and certification are not what the analysis turns on. The question is whether the accommodation is necessary because of a disability and reasonable under the Act, assessed on the information available. A purchased certificate does not establish that, and the absence of one does not defeat it.

Where The Answer Can Still Be No

The accommodation obligation is not unlimited, and the Fair Housing Act provides the underlying limits that the 2004 Joint Statement explains.

No disability, or no request by or on behalf of a person with a disability.

No disability-related need — no identifiable relationship between the animal and the disability.

Undue financial and administrative burden, assessed case by case.

Fundamental alteration of the provider's operations.

And direct threat. The Act does not protect an individual whose tenancy would constitute a direct threat to the health or safety of other individuals, or would result in substantial physical damage to the property of others, unless the threat can be eliminated or significantly reduced by reasonable accommodation. But that determination must rest on an individualised assessment based on reliable objective evidence — current conduct or a recent history of overt acts — and not on fear, speculation or stereotype.

A general breed restriction cannot substitute for the individualised direct-threat analysis.

And where the refusal is on reasonableness grounds, the Joint Statement says the provider should discuss whether an alternative accommodation would meet the need, and must grant one that would and is reasonable.

What To Do With Your Policy Now

Six things.

1. Find the citations. Any policy or training deck citing FHEO 2020-01 or FHEO 2013-01 needs a new stated basis. The substantive positions may well survive. The authority you wrote down does not.

2. Cite what is current instead. §100.204 and its example, 42 U.S.C. §3604(f)(3)(B), the 2004 Joint Statement, and your state and local law.

3. Check the state layer properly. Several states have assistance animal statutes with their own verification rules, definitions and penalties. Those laws were not withdrawn by HUD's action and may impose additional requirements.

4. Do not change your charging practice on the strength of the withdrawal. The fee position rests on the accommodation analysis, not on the withdrawn notice.

5. Audit the verification form against the three situations described above. A form that asks for the same information regardless of whether the disability or the need is apparent is likely to request more than is appropriate in at least one of them.

6. And strengthen the individual record. Without a published framework to point at, what defends a decision is the note explaining what was requested, what was considered, what was decided and why. Across a portfolio, that means holding the decision against the unit rather than in an inbox. 

The Underlying Point

The withdrawal removed two HUD documents that provided detailed guidance on applying the rule. It did not remove the rule, and it did not remove the regulation whose first illustrative example is a dog in a no-pets building.

An operator who reads the withdrawal as permission is reasoning from the absence of guidance rather than from the law.

FAQ

1. Was the assistance animal guidance withdrawn?
Yes. FHEO 2020-01 and FHEO Notice 2013-01 were withdrawn effective 17 September 2025 and should not be relied upon as authoritative.

2. Does that mean assistance animals are no longer accommodated?
No. The Fair Housing Act and 24 CFR 100.204 remain in effect. The 2004 HUD and DOJ Joint Statement remains publicly available and provides technical assistance on reasonable accommodations. State and local assistance animal laws were not withdrawn by HUD's action and may impose additional requirements.

3. Can I charge a pet fee for an assistance animal now?
The withdrawal does not by itself authorise that. The 2004 Joint Statement states that providers may not require extra fees or deposits as a condition of receiving a reasonable accommodation, and its example states that a provider may not require a fee or security deposit as a condition of allowing an assistance animal. Take advice before changing any charging practice.

4. Can I charge for damage the animal causes?
Charging for damage actually caused, or deducting it from the standard security deposit imposed on all tenants, is permitted where it is the provider's practice to assess tenants for damage they cause.

5. What can I ask for?
Where the disability and the need are both readily apparent, requesting additional documentation is unlikely to be appropriate. Where the disability is apparent but the need is not, only information necessary to evaluate the disability-related need. Where the disability is not apparent, the Joint Statement's framework contemplates reliable information verifying the disability, describing the accommodation and showing the relationship between them.

Sources: 24 CFR 100.204, Reasonable accommodations, including Example (1) concerning a blind applicant, a seeing eye dog and a no pets policy; 42 U.S.C. § 3604(f)(3)(B); Joint Statement of the Department of Housing and Urban Development and the Department of Justice, Reasonable Accommodations Under the Fair Housing Act, May 2004, which is technical assistance rather than binding authority, for the inquiry framework, the verification sources, the fee position, the grounds for denial, the alternative accommodation discussion and the direct threat assessment; HUD's Notice of Withdrawal of Guidance Documents dated 17 September 2025, under which FHEO 2020-01 and FHEO Notice 2013-01 were withdrawn; and the Notification of Withdrawal of Fair Housing and Equal Opportunity Guidance Documents, Federal Register, published 6 April 2026, which is the formal Federal Register notice confirming the withdrawal and its effective date of 17 September 2025. The description of an assistance animal in this article is not a current statutory or regulatory definition under the Fair Housing Act; state law may define the term and impose additional requirements. Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act imposes additional obligations on recipients of federal financial assistance. This article describes general concepts and is not legal advice. Confirm your position with counsel before changing an animal policy or responding to a specific request.