Pet deposits and pet rent for an emotional support animal in California

What used to be true

HUD's 2020 assistance animal notice said plainly that an assistance animal is not a pet, and that a housing provider may not charge a pet fee, a pet deposit or pet rent for one. Almost every page you will find on this subject is still repeating that sentence.

What changed

On 22 May 2026 HUD permanently rescinded its 2020 assistance animal notice and narrowed its own enforcement to animals individually trained to do work or perform tasks for a person with a disability. That is the Americans with Disabilities Act service animal test, and an emotional support animal does not meet it. A complaint to HUD about a refused emotional support animal is now unlikely to produce a finding of reasonable cause.

Where that leaves California

California has its own fair housing statute, the Fair Employment and Housing Act (Cal. Gov. Code § 12955), enforced by the California Civil Rights Department. A state complaint runs on state law, so HUD changing its own enforcement priorities does not decide it.

California also legislated on emotional support animals directly, which most states have not. These are the sections that matter:

• Cal. Health & Safety Code § 122318: Requires a seller of an emotional support animal certificate, registration, tag or similar product to state in writing that the product does not confer the rights of an assistance animal.
• Cal. Health & Safety Code § 122319: Sets what a health care practitioner must do before issuing emotional support animal documentation: hold a valid active licence, be licensed in the jurisdiction where the documentation is provided, complete a clinical evaluation, establish a client-provider relationship of at least thirty days, and state the licence type, number, jurisdiction and effective date in the document.
• Cal. Penal Code § 365.7: Makes it a misdemeanor to knowingly and fraudulently represent oneself as the owner or trainer of a service dog.

Deposit rules in California

With the federal guidance withdrawn, the argument runs on ordinary California landlord-tenant law, which is where most of the real variation between states now sits.

• California caps a residential security deposit at one month's rent.
• A deposit has to be returned within 21 days of the end of the tenancy.
• California does not permit a genuinely non-refundable pet fee. A charge called a fee is treated as a deposit and has to be accounted for, which matters because a refundable deposit is a far weaker thing for a landlord to insist on.

If you move

A letter is tied to the licence of the clinician who wrote it, not to your lease. Moving out of California does not void it, but a new housing provider is entitled to reliable documentation, and a clinician licensed only in California is a weaker answer to that question once you live somewhere else. California sits in the Pacific, and the rules next door are not the same.

Alaska, Hawaii, Oregon, Washington run on the federal position plus their own fair housing statute, much as California does.

What is not in doubt

• You remain liable for damage the animal actually causes, everywhere, and always did. An accommodation is not an indemnity.
• A provider may apply an ordinary damage deposit that it applies to every tenant, animal or not.
• A refundable deposit and a non-refundable pet fee are different things and get argued about differently.
• Nothing here stops a provider agreeing to waive a fee, and many still do rather than litigate.