# ESA Letter in Dunwoody, GA: Your Renewal Date Decides the Deposit

> Dunwoody has no local fair housing office, so ESA renters go to the state Commission — and any lease renewed since July 2024 changed the deposit rules.

- Source: https://supportanimal.com/blog/georgia-emotional-support-animal/dunwoody/
- Publisher: Support Animal (supportanimal.com)
- Updated: 2026-08-08
- License note: informational content; not legal or medical advice.

## Key facts

- Population: 51,795
- Households renting: 43.8%
- Typical pet deposit (as a pet): Varies by building
- Typical pet rent (as a pet): Varies by building
- Breed/weight limits common: yes
- Pet fees, deposits, and breed limits with a valid ESA letter: none (FHA reasonable accommodation)

## The date on your renewal, not the date you moved in

Sign a twelve-month lease in Dunwoody in 2023, renew it once, and you are
living under a deposit rule that did not exist when you unpacked. House
Bill 404 added O.C.G.A. § 44-7-30.1, which caps a security deposit at two
months' rent, and section 6 of that Act applies it to residential leases
entered into **or renewed** on or after July 1, 2024.

That second word carries most of the weight in a city like this one.
Dunwoody is the smallest of Georgia's twenty largest cities (51,795
people on the Census Bureau's Vintage 2024 estimate), and 43.8% of its
households rent rather than own on the 2020-2024 American Community
Survey five-year estimate, comfortably above the statewide 34.3%. It is
also an office city, and office cities turn over. Demand here comes
largely from corporate relocation into the surrounding business parks, so
tenancies tend to be short and renewal paperwork frequent. Each signature
on a renewal pulls the whole lease forward into the current rules.

## No local office, and what that actually simplifies

There is no city fair housing office in Dunwoody. The city has no
verified civil-rights or fair housing body of its own, and none is
verified at DeKalb County either. Atlanta's Human Relations Commission
handles conduct inside Atlanta's city limits; it is not a route for a
Dunwoody tenant, however close the two places sit on a map.

So your complaint goes to one place: the Fair Housing Division of the
Georgia Commission on Equal Opportunity. The Georgia Fair Housing Law it
administers bars discrimination in residential real estate transactions,
disability included. That is less of a loss than it sounds.
One office means one form, one deadline and one file. Where a locality
does hold HUD certification as a substantially equivalent agency the
Commission must refer a complaint to it, but HUD's roster names no
certified locality in Georgia, so the state route is the only route.

## Three numbers to keep in your phone

One year is the filing deadline at the Commission, under Ga. Comp. R. &
Regs. r. 186-2-.03(2)(b), running from when the discriminatory practice
occurred or terminated rather than from when you noticed it.

Two years is the deadline for a civil action under O.C.G.A. § 8-3-217,
and time spent in an administrative proceeding on the same practice is
excluded from that count, so going to the Commission first does not burn
the court clock. Time spent negotiating privately with a leasing office
is not excluded, which matters when a request drags across a relocation.

Twenty days is the window, after a charge is issued, in which either side
may elect to have the claims decided in court instead of before the
Commission. If that election is made, the Attorney General commences the
action in Superior Court. In between, the Administrator must open an
investigation within 30 days and aims to finish within 100.

## The rule an assistance animal request stands on

Ga. Comp. R. & Regs. r. 186-2-.02(4)(e) is the provision to name in your
letter. It treats a refusal as unlawful wherever the accommodation asked
for (in a rule, a policy, a practice or a service) is what a
handicapped person needs before the dwelling unit, and the building's
public and common areas with it, can be used and enjoyed on equal terms.
Worked examples sit at 24 C.F.R. § 100.204(b), where the rule sends the
Administrator.

Two supporting pieces are worth knowing. The regulation's definition of
handicap at r. 186-2-.02(4)(b)14 expressly includes emotional or mental
illness, so a psychiatric condition is inside the protected class without
any argument. And r. 186-2-.02(4)(c)4 sets the limit: a landlord may
decline where the tenancy would put health or safety in direct danger,
or would inflict substantial physical damage on what other people own.
No Georgia provision says an animal's mere presence can never amount to
a threat, so the assessment turns on what your particular animal has
actually done.

## July 2026 changed the words, not the claim

Georgia rewrote its service dog law effective July 1, 2026. Under the new
O.C.G.A. § 30-4-1(5), a service dog is a domestic canine individually
trained to do a specific job or task, and the definition expressly
excludes a dog that solely provides comfort, companionship, or emotional
support, regardless of the handler's disability status. Emotional support
animals now sit outside Chapter 4 of Title 30 entirely.

Your housing request was never built on that chapter, so nothing about it
changed. What did change is the cost of sloppy language: § 30-4-4(b) now
makes it a misdemeanor of a high and aggravated nature (up to $2,000.00,
30 days, or both), to deliberately misrepresent yourself as qualified to
use a service dog in order to secure rights under that chapter. The fix
is simple and accurate. Ask a Dunwoody leasing office for a reasonable
accommodation for an assistance animal. Do not call it a service dog.

## Charges the lease can set and no statute can cap

Georgia does not regulate pet fees. There is no ceiling on a pet deposit,
no limit on monthly pet rent, and no state review of a breed or weight
list. Dunwoody's managed apartment communities generally carry all three.

What removes those charges for an approved assistance animal is the
accommodation duty itself, not a price control: waiving a pet fee is an
exception to a policy, and refusing to make that exception where it is
necessary is the violation. Settle it before the charge starts posting.
On a short relocation tenancy, a pet charge left running for most of the
term stops being a policy question and turns into an argument about
deposit deductions at move-out, a much worse position to argue from.

## The ten-unit line, which usually falls your way here

Georgia splits landlords by size, and in Dunwoody the split generally
helps. Landlords who own more than ten rental units, counting a spouse's
and children's, or who use a management agent, owe you an escrowed
deposit or a posted bond, formal inspections at move-in and at move-out,
and treble damages together with attorney fees if a deposit is withheld
wrongfully. Nearly every apartment community in the city is on that side.

Size makes no difference to one duty: the deposit must be settled up
within 30 days of the lease's end or your departure, whichever comes
later, and any damage claimed must be stated in writing. Itemisation is
due within three business days of termination; you then have five days
to inspect, and items you do not dispute in writing stand. Separately,
r. 186-2-.02(4)(d)1 bars raising a customarily required deposit because a
tenant has a handicap.

## When the landlord's identity decides the question

Georgia's fair housing exemptions reach disability, unlike some states',
so who owns the building can end the analysis before it starts. Under
r. 186-2-.02(1)(c)3-4, the rules do not apply to an owner-occupied
building of no more than four families where the owner lives in one of
them, nor to a single-family dwelling rented without a broker by an owner
holding an interest in no more than three.

For most Dunwoody renters this is academic. A professionally managed
community is squarely covered. It bites on the city's townhouse and
single-family rentals, where an owner with two or three properties and no
agent may be outside the duty altogether. Check who signs your lease and
whether an agent is involved before you assume the rule applies.

## Getting help when the nearest office is a state one

Atlanta Legal Aid Society provides free civil legal assistance to
low-income Georgians and covers DeKalb County, which includes Dunwoody.
It is a general civil legal aid provider, so ask what it can take on
rather than assuming a housing case fits.

For the ground rules, the Georgia Department of Community Affairs
publishes the Georgia Landlord-Tenant Handbook, which sets out the
deposit regime and gives waiving a no-pet policy for a tenant who needs
an assistive animal as its own worked example of an accommodation. And if
you are refused, one more provision is worth knowing: under O.C.G.A.
§ 44-7-24, retaliation is presumed if a landlord evicts, cuts services,
raises the rent or terminates within three months of a protected action.

## What Dunwoody landlords can and cannot do

**Cannot:**
- Cannot refuse to make reasonable accommodations in rules, policies, practices, or services where necessary to afford a person with a handicap equal opportunity to use and enjoy a dwelling unit, including public and common use areas, under Ga. Comp. R. & Regs. r. 186-2-.02(4)(e)
- Cannot apply a no-pets rule to an approved assistance animal, waiving one being the worked example the Georgia Department of Community Affairs gives of a reasonable accommodation
- Cannot ask an applicant whether they have a handicap, or ask about its nature or severity, outside the four inquiries listed at Ga. Comp. R. & Regs. r. 186-2-.02(4)(c)3 and only where those are put to every applicant
- Cannot increase a customarily required security deposit because a tenant has a handicap, under Ga. Comp. R. & Regs. r. 186-2-.02(4)(d)1
- Cannot demand or receive a security deposit exceeding two months' rent on any lease entered into or renewed on or after July 1, 2024, under O.C.G.A. § 44-7-30.1
- Cannot impose different terms, conditions or privileges of rental, or deny services or facilities in connection with a dwelling, because of handicap, under Ga. Comp. R. & Regs. r. 186-2-.02(4)(c)2
- Cannot keep any part of a deposit without returning it within 30 days of the lease ending or the tenant leaving, whichever is later, together with written notice of the damage claimed
- Cannot retaliate for a repair request, a tenant organisation, a good faith code complaint or an attempt to enforce a lease right, with retaliation presumed if the landlord acts within three months under O.C.G.A. § 44-7-24
- Cannot rely on O.C.G.A. § 30-4-3 to refuse an emotional support animal, because that section governs task-trained service dogs and says nothing about what fair housing law requires

**Can:**
- May decline where the specific animal's tenancy would be a direct threat to the health or safety of others or would result in substantial physical damage to the property of others, under Ga. Comp. R. & Regs. r. 186-2-.02(4)(c)4
- May ask for information establishing the disability and the disability-related need for the animal where neither is obvious, the accommodation analysis being the one Georgia's regulator imports from 24 C.F.R. § 100.204(b)
- May hold the tenant liable for damage the animal actually causes, and may deduct it from the deposit with the itemisation the deposit rules require
- May be outside the duty altogether if the letting is an owner-occupied building of no more than four units, or a single-family dwelling let without a broker by an owner who has an interest in no more than three, under Ga. Comp. R. & Regs. r. 186-2-.02(1)(c)3-4
- May be required to hold the deposit in escrow or post a bond, to run formal move-in and move-out inspections, and to face treble damages for wrongful withholding, but only where the landlord owns more than ten rental units or uses a management agent

## How to get an ESA letter in Dunwoody

1. **Check that you qualify**, Answer a short screening about how your condition affects daily life in Dunwoody. No diagnosis paperwork needed up front. (About 5 minutes: free)
2. **Connect with a licensed professional**, You are matched with a provider licensed for Georgia clients who reviews your situation in a telehealth evaluation. (Telehealth evaluation)
3. **Complete your evaluation**, The professional evaluates whether an emotional support animal alleviates symptoms of a condition recognized in the DSM-5. Honest evaluations, not everyone qualifies. (Most of Our Applicants Qualify)
4. **Receive your signed letter**, Your letter arrives on the professional's letterhead with their license number: the documentation Georgia landlords may lawfully request. (Typically within days of approval)
5. **Send it to your landlord**, Submit the letter with a short reasonable-accommodation request. Pet fees, pet deposits, and breed limits no longer apply to your animal in Dunwoody. (Protection under FHA + state law)

## Conditions that can qualify for an ESA

No fixed government list exists. A licensed professional evaluates whether an animal alleviates symptoms of a DSM-5-recognized condition, commonly:

- Generalized anxiety disorder
- Major depressive disorder
- Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD)
- Panic disorder
- Social anxiety disorder
- Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD)
- Bipolar disorder
- Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD)
- Phobias with housing impact
- Chronic stress affecting daily function

## Housing help in Dunwoody

- [Georgia Commission on Equal Opportunity, Fair Housing Division](https://gceo.georgia.gov/fair-housing-division) (state agency)
- [Georgia Landlord-Tenant Handbook](https://dca.georgia.gov/document/manuals/georgia-landlord-tenant-handbook/download) (state guide)
- [Atlanta Legal Aid Society](https://atlantalegalaid.org/) (legal aid)

## Frequently asked questions

### Is there a fair housing office in Dunwoody?

No. Dunwoody has no local civil-rights or fair housing body, and no such office is verified for DeKalb County either, so your route is the state one. Complaints go to the Fair Housing Division of the Georgia Commission on Equal Opportunity, which enforces the Georgia Fair Housing Law in residential real estate transactions, disability included. Atlanta's Human Relations Commission reaches only conduct inside Atlanta city limits, not Dunwoody.

### My Dunwoody lease started in 2023. Does the two-month deposit cap apply to me?

Not to the original lease, but probably to the one you are on now. O.C.G.A. § 44-7-30.1 caps a security deposit at two months' rent, and House Bill 404 applies that to leases entered into or renewed on or after July 1, 2024. A renewal counts. In a city built on one-year apartment terms, most Dunwoody tenants have signed at least one renewal since that date.

### I am relocating to Dunwoody for a job. When should I make the request?

Before you sign if you can, and always in writing. Screening is the stage Georgia limits: Ga. Comp. R. & Regs. r. 186-2-.02(4)(c)3 makes it unlawful to ask an applicant whether they have a handicap or how severe it is. Once you have asked for an accommodation, questions about your disability and your need for the animal become fair. A short corporate tenancy leaves little room to fix a refusal later.

### Does my Dunwoody apartment's pet rent apply to an approved assistance animal?

It should not, though not because a statute forbids the charge. Georgia does not regulate pet fees at any amount. The work is done by Ga. Comp. R. & Regs. r. 186-2-.02(4)(e): dropping the fee for an approved assistance animal is precisely the kind of exception to a policy the rule contemplates, and withholding it when the tenant needs it is what makes the refusal unlawful. Ask in writing and keep the reply.

### Did the 2026 service dog law change anything for Dunwoody renters?

No, though it changed the vocabulary you should use. Since July 1, 2026 the definition at O.C.G.A. § 30-4-1(5) has covered only a dog task-trained for its handler, expressly excluding one that solely gives comfort, companionship, or emotional support. An emotional support animal therefore sits outside Chapter 4 of Title 30 altogether. Housing requests were always argued under the Georgia Fair Housing Law instead.

### How long do I have to complain, and who decides it?

One year from when the practice occurred or ended, under Ga. Comp. R. & Regs. r. 186-2-.03(2)(b), to the Commission on Equal Opportunity, or two years to sue under O.C.G.A. § 8-3-217, excluding any time an administrative case was pending. Investigations open within 30 days and aim to close within 100. Either side may elect court within 20 days of a charge, after which the Attorney General brings it in Superior Court.

### Does it matter who my Dunwoody landlord is?

It can decide whether the duty applies at all. Ga. Comp. R. & Regs. r. 186-2-.02(1)(c)3-4 exempts an owner-occupied building of no more than four units, and a single-family dwelling let without a broker by an owner holding an interest in no more than three. Those exemptions reach disability. A large managed apartment community is squarely covered; a house let directly by an owner with two other rentals may not be.

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Get evaluated by a licensed provider: https://my.supportanimal.com/qualify?sa_source=blog&sa_medium=blog&sa_campaign=esa-guides&sa_content=markdown&ref=blog&sa_term=georgia-emotional-support-animal%2Fdunwoody