Q on buying a rental with Lead Paint & MA Laws

Just a question:

Would I be crazy to buy a home that wasen’t deleaded? The reason I ask - in MA you cannot rent to a family with a child under 6 if lead paint is present and under the Fair Housing laws you cannot discriminate against a family with children. So in essence I can’t rent to a family with kids under six, nor can I discriminate against them.

I have found a great property that is not deleaded - would I be crazy to buy it for liability reasons (people do it all the time)?

Thoughts?

This is one of those subjects that I honestly could not answer for you direct so I guess the best advice I could give you is to send you this link and show you how minamal the risks are I perosnally buy them all the time chances are it has been deleaded and you don’t know about it sense they have not made lead based paint for years here is the link on how to get rid of lead based paint also keep in mind that you have to sign a lead based paint disclouser when you buy and sell the property as well as if it is a rental I always have the tenant sign one as well… Hope this helps Robb

http://www.health.state.ny.us/nysdoh/lead/leadbroc.htm

Chances are the home has been painted sense 1978 and it is not a problem!

I’d buy a lead paint home no problem. It’s federal law to provide the disclosure to residents or new owners. If it’s a tenant, they have the right to break their lease a certain number of days after receiving the notice if the place has lead paint.

Usually, you can just paint over it or get rid of it. It used to be a huge scare, but people know the remedies. Not giving legal advice here, but if you disclose the presence of it and/or get rid of it, you may be ok.