TRANSMOGRIFY: Emotional Support Animals To Become Pets
Published On: August 7, 2026 Posted by: Jeremy Peterson
In an exciting development for income property owners everywhere, HUD has recently modified their guidelines related to emotional support animals. In 2020, HUD guidelines directed landlords to consider ESAs the same as trained service animals. This meant that landlords were compelled to offer accommodations to anyone presenting documentation of an animal being an ESA.
In practice, what this meant is that pet owners who wished to have more rental options could document their animal and thus require the owner to accommodate them. We watched this in real time as tenants even moved in to some of our rental units with undisclosed pets and once those pets were discovered (a lease violation) the documentation arrived shortly thereafter declaring the animals ESAs. This act effectively nullified the lease violation.
While most people might not see a problem with this, the reality is that the old regulation unreasonably shifted risk away from tenants and on to landlords. As part of the accommodation, landlords were not permitted to charge additional rent or enhance security deposits to offset the increased risk of damage to the property posed by ESAs. The increase in risk of damage to a property is directly proportional to the increase in the number of undiapered bladders and bowels in a home that are untrained in the use of toilet facilities.
We are excited for this rule change as it brings back accountability and allows landlords to price risk according to the circumstances. While the rule change has happened at the federal level, Utah law still conforms to the 2020 standards and will likely be brought into compliance with the new standard in 2027. Thus, the old rules still apply for now. But, change is coming.
