Fayetteville reminds landlords of new registration law

Fayetteville satellite photo: Google Maps

Landlords in Fayetteville who own three or more rentals have until the end of the month to register contact information of a designated representative for each of their properties.

The City Council in August passed an ordinance aimed at ensuring renters, neighbors and city staff will have a means of reaching landlords who may be difficult to contact if there are problems with the leased property.

At the time, council members said they had received complaints from people who had concerns about neighborhood tenants, but didn’t know how to contact the landlords since some properties are owned by an LLC, corporation or trust that doesn’t advertise its contact information.

The new law requires landlords with three or more long-term rental properties in Fayetteville to provide their representative’s full name, mailing address, email address and telephone number to the online registry. The information is publicly available for anyone to access.

Designated representatives should have the power and responsibility to respond to questions, issues and problems with tenants, and to be an additional agent to facilitate communication with the landlord. Representatives must live or work in Washington, Benton, Crawford or Madison County, Arkansas. If the representative changes, the landlord is required to update the registry within seven days.

Owners of short-term rentals like Airbnb properties are not required to participate.

There is no fee to landlords to register their representatives, or to the public to access and search the registry.

The deadline to comply with the new law is April 30. Those who fail to register on time will be subject to fines.

To register, or for additional information, visit www.fayetteville-ar.gov/landlord.