Tenant Consent to Disclose EIV Income Info

As a property manager working in the affordable housing industry, how can I prevent the sharing of EIV reports during the tenants recertification interview when all household members are present?

For instance; Unless consent is provided by the individual family member all information must be kept private. during the recertification interview. this means that a HOH lives with her 20 year old son you can’t discuss mother’s income info with the adult son and cannot discuss son’s info with the HOH, unless consent is provided by the individual.

What if both members recertify together at the same time? What if you are fixing an income discrepancy and you need both HOH and 20 year old son to sign the repayment agreement? Do you need to get the consent signed in these cases?  What if you’re not sharing the hard copy EIV reports, just the “information” from the reports?

If you are going to share the EIV reports during the meeting you have to get consent.  This has been the case since 2009. HUD finally clarified and provided the sample form in 2011.  It’s the information, in any form, that is protected. Yes it can be tough to deal with when you have tenants that refuse to sign the consent but there is no other way. There are stiff penalties for sharing the “information” without consent.

Owner/Agents should have the EIV consent completed each time they have a 9887/9887-A completed. Tenants are more apt to give consent at that time. If you wait until there is a discrepancy and one household member is mad at the other for not reporting you are less likely to get the consent.

HUD did provide a sample form in HUD Notice H2011-21 called Attachment 10: Sample Tenant Consent to Disclose EIV Income Information.

Attachment 10: HUD Sample Tenant Consent to Disclose EIV Income Information.pdf

See excerpt 8-20, B 3 of the current 4350.3 Rev. 1 Change 4 HUD Occupancy Handbook:

B. Nondisclosure of Income Information

The Federal Privacy Act (5 USC 552a, as amended) prohibits the disclosure of an individual’s information to another person without the written consent of such individual. As such, the EIV data of an adult household member may not be shared (or a copy provided or displayed) with another adult household member, unless the individual has provided written consent to disclose such information. However, the O/A is not prohibited from discussing with the head of household (HOH) and showing the HOH how the household’s income and rent were determined based on the total income reported and verified. See Chapter 9, Paragraph 9-17, Disclosure of EIV Data.*

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