The Tricon Residential lawsuit was a federal class action filed in November 2024 by an Indianapolis renter, Marckus Williams, and the Fair Housing Center of Central Indiana, alleging that Tricon’s tenant screening policies discriminated against Black applicants by using blanket bans on criminal and eviction records. The case, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California, was resolved through a confidential settlement and dismissed with prejudice on May 30, 2025.1Civil Rights Litigation Clearinghouse. Williams v. Tricon Residential, Inc.
Who Sued Tricon and Why
Marckus Williams is a 39-year-old Indianapolis native who spent a decade in prison on drug-related convictions before completing a court-ordered reentry program in 2017. He later worked with an attorney to have a 2006 cocaine possession conviction and a 2012 drug possession guilty plea expunged.2IndyStar. Indianapolis Landlords Sued for Discrimination Against Black Renters
In late 2022, Williams applied to rent a Tricon home. According to the complaint, the third-party screening report flagged three items: two convictions that had been legally expunged, and his 2017 reentry program participation, which was not a conviction at all. Tricon denied the application automatically, without contacting him or checking whether the report was accurate.3Relman Colfax. Williams and the Fair Housing Center of Central Indiana v. Tricon Residential, Inc. Williams and his family spent December 2022 without a home, and he slept in his car to stay warm.2IndyStar. Indianapolis Landlords Sued for Discrimination Against Black Renters
Williams was joined as a plaintiff by the Fair Housing Center of Central Indiana (FHCCI), which had conducted its own investigation into Tricon’s screening practices. Both were represented by the Washington, D.C. civil rights firm Relman Colfax. The complaint brought claims under the federal Fair Housing Act and the California Fair Employment and Housing Act.3Relman Colfax. Williams and the Fair Housing Center of Central Indiana v. Tricon Residential, Inc.
The Screening Policies at the Heart of the Case
The complaint challenged two Tricon screening rules that plaintiffs described as blanket bans applied across the company’s national portfolio of roughly 38,000 single-family rental homes.4SEC. Tricon Residential Inc. Annual Information Form 2023
- An automatic denial for any felony conviction within the past seven years, plus a permanent ban for offenses including arson, crimes against children, homicide, kidnapping, and sex crimes, no matter how old.
- An automatic denial for any eviction filing within at least the past two years, without distinguishing between filings that produced a judgment and those that were dismissed, settled, or resolved in the tenant’s favor.
According to the complaint, Tricon applied these criteria mechanically. Applicants were rejected without verification of the screening report, without consideration of expunged or sealed records, and without any individualized review. Company representatives allegedly confirmed the policies were enforced as “no exceptions” criteria.5Relman Colfax. Williams v. Tricon Residential Class Action Complaint
The Discrimination Theory and the Numbers
The suit’s legal theory was disparate impact: a facially neutral policy can violate the Fair Housing Act if it disproportionately harms a protected group without adequate justification. Plaintiffs argued that because Black Americans are overrepresented in criminal records and eviction filings, categorical exclusions on those grounds inevitably screen out Black applicants at much higher rates than white applicants.6FHCCI. Williams v. Tricon Residential Complaint Filing
Drawing on FHCCI’s investigation, the complaint cited specific figures. Under the criminal history ban, Black individuals were allegedly disqualified at a rate 5.32 times greater than white individuals. Under the eviction filing ban, Black women were overrepresented in eviction filings by nearly 200 percent; Black women without children were threatened with eviction at roughly 6.8 times the rate of white women without children, and Black women with children at about 4.3 times the rate of their white counterparts.5Relman Colfax. Williams v. Tricon Residential Class Action Complaint
The complaint sought to certify a nationwide class of all Black applicants who were otherwise qualified but were automatically rejected under Tricon’s criminal history policy from January 1, 2015 onward, and it asked the court to order Tricon to stop using categorical bans and adopt individualized review.1Civil Rights Litigation Clearinghouse. Williams v. Tricon Residential, Inc.
The lawsuit landed against a well-developed regulatory backdrop. HUD had issued guidance as early as 2016 warning that blanket criminal-history exclusions can violate the Fair Housing Act through disparate impact, and in spring 2024 HUD’s Office of Fair Housing and Equal Opportunity issued detailed guidance warning that overbroad screening criteria and reliance on automated scoring do not shield housing providers from liability.7HUD FHEO. Guidance on Application of the Fair Housing Act to the Screening of Applicants for Rental Housing
Tricon’s Response
A Tricon spokesperson told media the company “adheres to all fair-housing laws” and called the allegations “baseless.”8Rental Housing Journal. Suit Charges Large Private Equity Landlords With Discrimination Blackstone, which had acquired Tricon and taken it private on May 1, 2024, declined to comment beyond noting that the events described in the suit occurred before it purchased the company.9NBC News. Private Equity Landlords’ Screening Process Discriminated Against Renters, Lawsuit Alleges
Tricon’s publicly posted screening criteria describe a policy narrower than the one the complaint alleged was applied in practice. On paper, the company states it does not consider arrests without convictions, misdemeanors, expunged or pardoned convictions, or sealed juvenile records, and that only eviction filings resulting in a judgment against the tenant within the past two years are considered.10Tricon Residential. Resources The website also references a “second look” process for criminal history flags and an “accuracy check” for eviction flags.11Tricon Residential. Terms of Agreement The complaint argued that in practice these safeguards did not function as meaningful reviews, and that Williams himself was rejected automatically over records that the posted policy said should have been excluded.5Relman Colfax. Williams v. Tricon Residential Class Action Complaint
How the Case Ended
The litigation moved quickly. Joint status reports in March and April 2025 indicated the parties were in settlement discussions, and on May 30, 2025, the plaintiffs filed a notice of voluntary dismissal with prejudice. Judge David O. Carter ordered the case terminated the same day, and Tricon’s pending motion to dismiss was denied as moot.12CourtListener. Marcus Williams v. Tricon Residential, Inc. DocketWilliams v. Tricon Residential, Inc.
A dismissal with prejudice means the claims are resolved permanently and cannot be refiled. The specific settlement terms, including any monetary payment or agreed changes to Tricon’s screening practices, were not made public. The proposed nationwide class was never certified; the case ended before the court ruled on that question, so no class-wide relief was ordered through the court.1Civil Rights Litigation Clearinghouse. Williams v. Tricon Residential, Inc.
The Companion Suit Against Progress Residential
On the same day the Tricon complaint was filed, Williams and FHCCI also sued Progress Residential, the nation’s largest single-family rental company with more than 90,000 homes, in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Indiana. That complaint raised similar disparate-impact claims focused on criminal history screening, alleging that Black applicants were 4.44 times more likely than white applicants to be disqualified by a ban on misdemeanor convictions and 8.16 times more likely to be disqualified for felony convictions.13FHCCI. Williams v. Progress Residential Complaint Filing14Civil Rights Litigation Clearinghouse. Williams v. Progress Residential, LLC9NBC News. Private Equity Landlords’ Screening Process Discriminated Against Renters, Lawsuit Alleges3Relman Colfax. Williams and the Fair Housing Center of Central Indiana v. Tricon Residential, Inc.
Other Complaints Against Tricon
The Williams case is not the only source of consumer complaints against Tricon, though the rest are separate from the fair housing litigation. As of mid-2026, the company’s Better Business Bureau profile listed 617 complaints filed over the preceding three years, with 287 closed in the most recent 12 months. The largest category was service and repair issues, with 339 complaints, followed by product, order, and billing disputes. Common tenant grievances included delayed or incomplete maintenance for problems such as water damage, mold, pests, and electrical hazards; withheld security deposits; double-billed utilities; and charges for amenities that did not function. Of the 617 total complaints, 492 had been answered by the company and 125 were marked as resolved to the complainant’s satisfaction.15BBB. Tricon Residential BBB Complaints