No race bias for online rental ads

No race bias for online rental ads

Errant property agents could face the sack, says head of real-estate firm PropNex.

Mon, Jul 21, 2008
my paper

by Marcel Lee Pereira

PROPERTY agents who post advertisements online that discriminate against a particular race could be sacked, said the head of a real-estate firm here.

PropNex chief executive Mohamed Ismail told my paper that he would send out a circular to all the firm's 8,000 agents at the end of the month to encourage them to not post online ads that 'blatantly say no to certain races' when it comes to renting a flat.

Mr Ismail was speaking in the wake of a letter to The Straits Times' Forum page this month, which pointed out that some online rental ads for flats seemed to discriminate against certain races or nationalities.

He added: 'This is to raise awareness. We have to be more sensitive. If we know there are agents still doing it, then we will counsel them and find out why. If they persist, their services may have to be terminated. 'This does not go well with our multi- racial society and such statements should not be advertised.'

my paper visited property classifieds website, www.sg-house.com, last week and spotted over 20 posts which appeared discriminatory. They were posted by agents from various property firms.

Some phrases used in the advertisements included, 'Not eligible to Indian' and 'Sorry to Indian and China'. Similar posts were seen on another classifieds site, www.adpost.com/sg.

Several property agents who placed the ads said they state races or nationalities at flat owners' request. They said owners generally do not discriminate based on race, but are entitled to decide on who they rent their properties to. For instance, a criterion could be a tenant's diet.

Asked why racial preference was stated in ads, instead of told discreetly to applicants, one agent, who declined to be named, said: 'It's more practical. If the landlord doesn't want to rent to Indian nationals, for example, I'll have to screen the majority of my calls as 80 per cent of my clients are Indians.'

But Mr Ismail countered: 'Such ads should not be displayed so openly. You can always say the owner is looking for someone who will not do Asian cooking, for example. That's very tactful.'

HSR Property Group's executive director Eric Cheng said the firm has a policy to 'do unto others what you want others to do unto you, so we should not be placing such ads'.

'Still, no company can guarantee that, because there are so many ads you can place online.'

Associate Professor Eleanor Wong, chairman of the Advertising Standards Authority of Singapore (ASAS), the self-regulating body which looks into the content of ads here, said ASAS is firmly against ads that discriminate solely on the basis of race or ethnicity.

Under the Singapore Code of Advertising Practice (Scap), ads should not discriminate against any ethnic group or religion, said Prof Wong.

She added: 'Here, there is some ambiguity because the potential landlord seems to be targeting a certain group of foreign nationals rather than a racial group per se.'

Owners of websites should ensure that the advertisements posted there comply with Scap, but ASAS can ask the webmaster to remove the post or amend the phrasing, as well as contact the person who made the post.

Tenants who spoke to my paper had encountered such ads when looking for a rental flat.

Said business analyst Kishor Autee, 28, an Indian national renting a flat in Ang Mo Kio: 'To anybody who comes looking for a place to rent, the first question asked is which race, and that gives a very bad impression of Singapore.'