The number of complaints people buying or selling houses filed over alleged discrimination declined for the third consecutive year in 2024, with a limited supply of homes on the market and high mortgage rates seen as contributing to a market slowdown.
The nonprofit National Fair Housing Alliance said in its annual trends report Wednesday that there were 659 sales-related complaints last year, down from 766 filings in 2023. That’s out of more than 32,000 overall discrimination complaints, most of which concerned renters. The report also identified 220 complaints related to mortgage lending and 27 concerning homeowners insurance.
The Trump administration’s reductions in aid to nonprofit fair housing agencies could also be a factor in the decline in reported complaints for the most recent year, the alliance said. These groups reported 74% of the complaints filed in 2024, with state and local government accounting for another 21%. The U.S. Justice and Housing and Urban Development departments collected the other complaints, according to the report.
Complaints of discrimination based on people’s race, color, religion and other categories have gradually increased over the past 10 years from just over 27,000 in 2014 to 32,321 in 2024 — although this year’s figure was down nearly 2,000 year over year. That could be because some agencies are unable to report data because they have had to lay off staff or even shut down due to federal funding cuts, according to the report.
“These actions have left disabled veterans seeking to get off the streets; seniors requiring modifications to their homes; families with children seeking a home; survivors of domestic violence fleeing sexual and physical abuse; Black and Latino potential homebuyers seeking a mortgage; and more unprotected,” the alliance said in a statement that accompanied the report.
There were nearly 18,000 complaints of housing discrimination in 2024 related to people’s disabilities, the report said, with filings about discrimination based on race second at just over 5,000 cases. Some filings concern alleged violations of federal law, such as protections based on race or sex, while others deal with state and local protections for categories such as gender identity or marital status.
The year 2024 was the second time that the alliance organized data on complaints related to housing appraisals. There were 39 such complaints last year, compared to 87 in 2023. But the alliance cautioned that neither federal nor state and local governments reported appraisal data for 2024, unlike in 2023, so all 39 complaints came from nonprofit fair housing agencies. That represented an increase for those groups from the 24 complaints they reported the previous year.
“Recent research, news stories and rising appraisal discrimination allegations all indicate that biases in appraisals negatively impact consumers and communities of color and exacerbate the racial wealth gap,” the report said.
The alliance also found an uptick in allegations of discrimination from homeowner or condo associations, from 130 in 2023 to 230 last year.