California Rental Application Form

Introduction

Key Things to Know

1. 1

   California's out-of-pocket ceiling is the half that usually decides the number, and it has two components. Section 1950.6(b) limits the application screening fee to the actual out-of-pocket costs of gathering information concerning the applicant, which the statute says expressly includes the cost of using a tenant screening service or a consumer credit reporting service, plus the reasonable value of time spent by the landlord or their agent in obtaining information on the applicant. In no case may the total be greater than the indexed thirty dollar figure. Where the two ceilings disagree, the lower one is the limit. That is how the section reads for 2026, and its last substantive amendment took effect January 1, 2025.

2. 2

   No California agency publishes the adjusted figure, because the statute never asked one to. Section 1950.6(b) says the thirty dollar application screening fee may be adjusted annually by the landlord or their agent commensurate with an increase in the Consumer Price Index, beginning on January 1, 1998. The adjustment is the private party's to make. The section names no index series and no publisher, so any number circulating as the current California figure is somebody's own calculation rather than a state publication. What is actually auditable is the receipt.

3. 3

   The itemized receipt is a statutory duty, not a courtesy. Section 1950.6(d) requires the landlord or their agent to provide the applicant with a receipt for the fee paid, and that receipt shall itemize the out-of-pocket expenses and time spent by the landlord or their agent to obtain and process the information about the applicant. The statute names the delivery methods: personally or by mail, and by email where the applicant has agreed to email. A receipt printing one total and nothing else has itemized nothing, which matters because a charge resting partly on the reasonable value of time spent cannot be weighed against the ceiling if the time is never stated.

4. 4

   Two things go to the applicant without being asked for. Section 1950.6(e) requires the landlord or their agent to return any amount of the screening fee not used for the purposes the section authorizes, where they did not perform a personal reference check or did not obtain a consumer credit report. Section 1950.6(f) then requires a copy of the consumer credit report to reach the applicant who is the subject of that report, by personal delivery, mail or email, within seven days of the landlord or their agent receiving it.

5. 5

   Since January 1, 2025 a California landlord has had to pick a lane before taking any money. Section 1950.6(c)(2) permits an application screening fee only if, at the time the fee is collected, the landlord offers one of two processes. Under the first, completed applications are considered in the order in which they were received as provided for in the landlord's established screening criteria, those criteria shall be provided to the applicant in writing together with the application form, the first applicant who meets them is approved for tenancy, and applicants are not charged unless or until their application is actually considered. Under the second, the entire screening fee is returned to any applicant not selected for tenancy, regardless of the reason, within seven days of selecting an applicant for tenancy or thirty days of when the application was submitted, whichever occurs first.

6. 6

   One California prohibition has nothing to do with the amount at all. Section 1950.6(c)(1) provides that a landlord or their agent shall not charge an applicant an application screening fee when they know or should have known that no rental unit is available at that time or will be available within a reasonable period of time. Collecting against a unit that is already gone is not an overcharge question, because no charge is permitted in the first place.

7. 7

   A reusable screening report is optional for the California landlord and costly to say yes to. Civil Code Section 1950.1(c) provides that a landlord may elect to accept reusable tenant screening reports, and Section 1950.1(h) states flatly that the section does not require a landlord to accept them. The consequence sits in Section 1950.1(d): where an applicant provides a reusable report to a landlord that does accept them, the landlord shall not charge either a fee to access the report or an application screening fee. To qualify the report must have been prepared within the previous thirty days by a consumer reporting agency at the applicant's request and expense, and must be available to the landlord at no cost to access or use.

California Requirements for Rental Application Form

• The Fee, Measured Against Both Ceilings

  Section 1950.6(b) sets two ceilings and the charge has to clear the lower of them. The first is the actual out-of-pocket costs of gathering information concerning the applicant, which the statute says includes the cost of using a tenant screening service or a consumer credit reporting service, plus the reasonable value of time spent by the landlord or their agent in obtaining information on the applicant. The second is thirty dollars per applicant, a figure the statute allows the landlord or their agent to adjust annually for the Consumer Price Index beginning on January 1, 1998. That is the text as it stands for 2026. No state office publishes the adjusted number, so the out-of-pocket ceiling is the one with a checkable basis.

• Which of the Two Screening Processes the Landlord Elected

  In force since January 1, 2025. Section 1950.6(c)(2) permits an application screening fee only if, at the time the fee is collected, the landlord offers either a first-come process in which completed applications are considered in the order received and nobody is charged unless or until their application is actually considered, or a process in which the entire fee is returned to any applicant not selected for tenancy, regardless of the reason, within seven days of selecting an applicant or thirty days of the application, whichever occurs first. The election has to exist when the money changes hands, not afterwards, and it decides which refund rule applies.

• The Written Screening Criteria, Handed Over With the Application Form

  This one attaches only to the first-come process. Section 1950.6(c)(2)(A)(i) provides that completed applications are considered, as provided for in the landlord's established screening criteria, in the order in which the completed applications were received, and that the screening criteria shall be provided to the applicant in writing together with the application form. Section 1950.6(c)(2)(A)(ii) adds that the first applicant who meets those criteria is approved for tenancy. A landlord who elected the full-return process instead is not subject to this written-criteria duty.

• An Itemized Receipt for the Fee

  Section 1950.6(d) requires the landlord or their agent to provide the applicant with a receipt for the fee paid, which receipt shall itemize the out-of-pocket expenses and time spent by the landlord or their agent to obtain and process the information about the applicant. Delivery is personally or by mail, and by email where the applicant has agreed to email. Keep it: the itemization is the only document that lets the charge be compared against the out-of-pocket ceiling, and a receipt showing a single total has itemized nothing.

• A Copy of the Consumer Credit Report, Within Seven Days

  Section 1950.6(f) provides that where an application screening fee has been paid, the landlord or their agent shall provide a copy of the consumer credit report to the applicant who is the subject of that report, by personal delivery, mail or email, within seven days of the landlord or their agent receiving the report. The clock runs from when the landlord receives the report, not from the decision, and the duty is not conditioned on the applicant asking.

• Return of the Unused Portion

  Section 1950.6(e) provides that if the landlord or their agent does not perform a personal reference check or does not obtain a consumer credit report, they shall return any amount of the screening fee that is not used for the purposes authorized by the section. This duty is independent of which of the two processes was elected, and it turns on what was actually done with the money rather than on whether the applicant was selected.

• The Alternative-Evidence Option Where There Is a Government Rent Subsidy

  Government Code Section 12955(o)(1), as amended effective January 1, 2024, provides that where there is a government rent subsidy a housing provider may not use a financial or income standard in assessing eligibility that is not based on the portion of the rent to be paid by the tenant, and may not use a person's credit history as part of the application process without offering the applicant the option, at the applicant's discretion, of providing lawful, verifiable alternative evidence of their reasonable ability to pay that portion, including government benefit payments, pay records and bank statements. Where the applicant elects that route, the provider shall allow reasonable time to respond and shall reasonably consider that evidence in lieu of credit history.

• Criminal-History Categories the Application May Not Ask About

  Section 12269(a) of Title 2 of the California Code of Regulations, part of Article 24 and operative January 1, 2020, makes it unlawful to seek, consider, use or take an adverse action based on an arrest that has not resulted in a criminal conviction, or on information that an individual was questioned, apprehended, taken into custody or detained or held for investigation; on a referral to or participation in a pre-trial or post-trial diversion or deferred entry of judgment program; on an infraction, or a conviction that has been sealed, dismissed, vacated, expunged, voided, invalidated or pardoned, or for which a certificate of rehabilitation was granted; or, unless pursuant to an applicable court order, on a juvenile justice system adjudication. Because the word is seek, the form itself may not ask. Section 12269(a)(5) separately makes a blanket ban, a categorical exclusion of everyone with a criminal record, unlawful in itself. The official California Code of Regulations is published commercially rather than on a state website, so this wording follows a published copy of the regulation; the state Attorney General's guidance to all cities and counties dated April 21, 2023 states the same categories.