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Pennsylvania landlord · tenant screening
Download the Pennsylvania residential rental application — screens prospective tenants with application-money elections, a standalone screening-report authorization, and the disclosures federal and Pennsylvania law require — in fillable Word and fillable PDF, with the Pennsylvania Completion & Use Guide.
Renting out property in more than one state? This page is the Pennsylvania application — each state's edition is built to its own screening and application-money law.
Bundle & save $19.97
Handle tenant screening, the lease, move-in condition records, and a Pennsylvania nonpayment notice workflow if you need it.
Use each document only when appropriate. The notice packet is not a move-in document and should be used only when the facts and current law support it.
Every file below is included: the fillable Word application, a fillable PDF, the Philadelphia Rental Application Rider (mandatory for City of Philadelphia properties), the Pennsylvania Completion and Use Guide, and the federal FCRA Summary of Your Rights.
The real document — not a mockup. Page 1 of the form included in your download.
Every part of the form, in order — the application summary, 17 sections, and the office-use panel.
About this form
A residential rental application is the landlord's first line of protection: it collects the applicant's identity, household composition, rental history, employment and income, and references, and it carries the disclosures and signed authorizations that make lawful tenant screening possible before a lease is signed.
Pennsylvania law shapes three things this edition builds in. First, money discipline: Pennsylvania sets no statewide cap, cost-basis rule, or refund duty for a rental application fee, so this edition authorizes only a nonrefundable application fee — never a holding deposit or earnest money, because money taken to hold or secure a unit is treated as a security deposit with caps, escrow, interest, and thirty-day return duties under 68 P.S. § 250.511a et seq. Second, protected-class breadth: the Pennsylvania Human Relations Act (43 P.S. § 951 et seq.) adds age forty and over, ancestry, religious creed, and users, handlers, and trainers of guide or support animals, bars application-form inquiries about protected classes (which is why this form never asks for dates of birth, ages, or adult/minor classifications), and the 2025 CROWN Act protects hair texture and protective hairstyles — while Pennsylvania’s Clean Slate law (18 Pa.C.S. § 9122.2) seals certain criminal records from screening entirely. Third, Philadelphia is different: a lesser-of-actual-cost-or-fifty-dollars fee cap, soft-pull-only credit checks, one fee per twelve months, mandatory written screening criteria, prohibited screening criteria, and denial, reconsideration, and next-available-unit duties all apply, so the Philadelphia Rental Application Rider (Form PL-PA-RA02) is mandatory and inseparable for City of Philadelphia properties.
The Pennsylvania Completion & Use Guide covers the money election and fee uniformity, written screening criteria as a fair-housing defense, voluntary reusable-report practice, the Clean Slate and source-of-income landscape (including the State College protection and the 2021 Pittsburgh ruling), adverse-action notices, the security-deposit primer, and recordkeeping — plus the statute watch on 2026 HB 558 (statewide application-fee limits pending in the Senate) and Philadelphia’s rental-suitability certificate amendment effective November 1, 2026. The kit includes the federal FCRA Summary of Your Rights as a package insert.
ILRG provides self-help legal forms and download support. PublicLegal landlord forms are provided for you to complete with your own property and screening information. Screening rules vary by state and change frequently — the Completion & Use Guide explains the rules in your state and the steps that keep this application within them. If you are not 100 percent satisfied after purchasing from us, contact us for a refund.
The Pennsylvania residential rental application in fillable Word (.docx) with a fillable PDF, the Philadelphia Rental Application Rider (Form PL-PA-RA02 — mandatory and inseparable for City of Philadelphia properties), the Pennsylvania Completion & Use Guide (money election, screening workflow, fair-housing landscape, adverse action, security-deposit primer, and recordkeeping), and the federal FCRA Summary of Your Rights. A completed sample is available as an optional add-on.
Not statewide: Pennsylvania sets no maximum, no cost-basis rule, and no refund duty, so the fee you elect in Section 1 is a uniform, nonrefundable screening charge — but never label money taken to hold a unit as a fee, because it is treated as a security deposit under 68 P.S. § 250.511a with caps, escrow, interest, and thirty-day return duties. A 2026 bill (HB 558) that would add statewide application-fee limits passed the House and was pending in the Senate at this edition’s review — recheck before charging. Philadelphia is different: the rider’s fee cap and rules control there.
The Philadelphia Rental Application Rider (Form PL-PA-RA02) is mandatory and inseparable for City of Philadelphia properties. Philadelphia Code § 9-814 caps any application fee at the lesser of the actual cost of the background/credit check or fifty dollars, permits only soft-pull credit checks, allows only one fee per twelve months, bars any fee for a check not performed, and requires copies of each check to the applicant. Sections 9-810 and 9-1108 add a written-criteria precondition before any application or fee, prohibited screening criteria with an individualized-assessment duty, a written statement of all denial reasons within three business days, a forty-eight-hour dispute and seven-business-day reconsideration window, and — for owners and managers with five or more Philadelphia units — a next-available-comparable-unit duty.
No Pennsylvania law requires acceptance — it is voluntary. If you accept an applicant’s report, verify it directly with the consumer reporting agency that prepared it and consider waiving the application fee. In Philadelphia, no fee may be charged for a background or credit check that is not performed, so if you rely solely on the applicant’s own report you may not charge a screening fee there.
If a consumer report contributed in whole or in part to the denial or to a conditional approval such as a higher deposit, federal law requires an adverse-action notice identifying the reporting agency, stating that the agency did not make the decision, and explaining the applicant’s free-report and dispute rights — the office-use panel checklist tracks each element. Philadelphia adds a written or electronic plain-language statement of all reasons within three business days with copies of third-party documents, a reconsideration window you must reasonably consider, and a compliance log in the rider. Elsewhere in the Commonwealth, a brief written reason kept consistent across applicants is strong fair-housing practice.