LAS VEGAS (KTNV) — The 2025 Legislature was definitely a mixed bag for people who rent their homes, and those who struggle with being able to afford a first home.
On the upside, Gov. Joe Lombardo's signature housing bill — Assembly Bill 540 — passed, providing for more than $180 million for attainable housing. The bill would also allow for expedited licenses for contractors working on affordable housing in rural areas.
WATCH | Steve Sebelius breaks down housing bills that have been passed or vetoed
And a bill that was vetoed last year came back in a modified form and got the governor's endorsement. Assembly Bill 121, by Assemblywoman Venicia Considine, would require transparency in rental fees up front, avoiding last-minute surprises for renters.
Considine said she altered her bill from last session's Assembly Bill 218 to address concerns raised in Lombardo's veto.
"Unfortunately, there is a need for this legislation," she said in an interview with Channel 13. "I feel that it is deceptive, and that's one of the reason that I brought the bill both times, is you're seeing an advertised price for an apartment or a house, and you go in, you tour it, you put down your non-refundable deposits, you really invested in this property and then they send you, potentially, a lease over that's 50 or 60 pages and they're just like, 'Sign, sign, sign sign.'"
Vetoed bills
But several other bills were rejected by Lombardo, who set a single-session veto record of 87 this year, bringing his cumulative first-term total to 162.
- Assembly Bill 280, which would have required landlords to refund application fees if the unit was rented to somebody else. It would also have imposed a 5% cap on rental increases for seniors. (The refund provisions were included in AB 121, however.)
- Assembly Bill 283, which would have required a landlord to file in court to evict a tenant. Under the current system, tenants must file first to contest a summary eviction.
- Assembly Bill 223, which would have allowed tenants to terminate their rental agreements without fees if their homes were substandard, or withhold rent if the tenant fixed the problem on their own. (The tenant would be required to file a complaint with the court, and place the past due rent into an escrow account.) It would also have required landlords to list contact information in rental paperwork.
- Assembly Bill 201, which would have allowed for sealing of eviction records, which can affect a person's ability to rent a new home.
- Assembly Bill 480, which would have banned policies that have a discriminatory effect in housing, even if the policies were not designed to discriminate. The bill would have applied a federal housing rule to state laws.
- Senate Bill 99, which would have imposed "linkage fees" on developers at Lake Tahoe in order to build affordable housing.
In addition, a bill by state Sen. Dina Neal, D-Clark County, that would have prohibited corporate entities from buying more than 100 homes per year failed, after Lombardo asked Republicans in the state Senate to vote no.
State Sen, Ira Hansen, R-Sparks, said he was inclined to vote for Neal's bill, Senate Bill 391, but cast a no vote because of Lombardo's request.
And another bill by Considine — which would have subjected corporate landlords to the state's commerce tax by treating all their residential holdings as a single company instead of individual entities — was converted into a interim study.
Bills that passed
But a number of other housing bills met with Lombardo's approval.
- Assembly Bill 475, which appropriates $15 million to Clark County for eviction diversion programs. The bill also allocates $5.2 million for Reno and $750,000 for the Nevada Rural Housing Authority.
- Assembly Bill 211, which allows local governments to declare a property substandard and appoint a receiver to fix the problems, with the property owner reimbursing the costs.
- Assembly Bill 241, which requires local governments to allow multi-family residential development on commercially zoned land.
- Senate Bill 28, which allows for the creation of tax-increment areas in which bonds are issued in order to build affordable housing projects.
- Assembly Bill 366, which appropriates $21 million to state Supportive Housing Development Account to develop supportive housing.
The future
Considine said she's interested in bringing back a bill regarding habitability of rental property in the 2027 session.
"I think maybe retooling that [bill], getting more folks to tell their stories," she said. "I think one of the barriers that I've learned over time is I might have firsthand knowledge, I might have people telling me what's really happening on the ground, but I have to convince 42 folks that what's happening is actually real. There's a lot of folks who've never been through situations like I'm talking about."
In addition, the results of the interim study on taxation of corporate landlords will have returned to lawmakers, so legislation may flow from that as well.
But as Considine's work with AB 121 shows, it sometimes takes more than one session — and a bit of compromise — to get a bill passed.
"My experience in talking with folks is having a conversation that it takes more than one thing," she said. "There's not going to be a silver bullet that solves everything. There's a lot of historical problems in our laws that make things inequitable playing fields where one side has too much power and the other side has none. ... I think we have to be very clear that that there's a lot of pieces to the puzzle and having one piece doesn't solve it."
