SCRA for Property Managers: Eviction Protection, Lease Termination, and Compliance

If you manage residential properties, the Servicemembers Civil Relief Act applies to you. whether you manage 50 units or 500,000. And the consequences of getting it wrong are escalating fast.

In the past two years alone, two of the largest property management companies in the country have faced DOJ enforcement:

• PRG Real Estate Management. $1.59 million settlement (the largest ever against a property manager) for filing 152 false affidavits to obtain default eviction judgments against 127 SCRA-protected servicemembers
• Greystar Management Services. $1.4 million settlement plus a 5-year consent decree after their property management software (Yardi, RealPage, Entrata) automatically charged military tenants illegal early termination fees

Both cases had the same root cause: the company’s standard operating procedures didn’t account for SCRA protections. In PRG’s case, they filed false affidavits. In Greystar’s case, their software applied fees by default. Neither was intentional. both were expensive.

Here’s what the SCRA requires of property managers and where violations most commonly occur. This guide covers property manager obligations. for a full overview of all SCRA requirements across industries, see our complete SCRA compliance guide.

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The Three Core Obligations

1. Eviction Protection (50 U.S.C. §3951)

The rule: You cannot evict an active-duty servicemember. or their dependents. without a court order. This applies even in states that allow non-judicial eviction.

What this means in practice:

• Before filing any eviction, you must determine whether the tenant is on active duty
• You must verify military status through the DMDC database. not assumptions, not the tenant’s word, not old records
• If the tenant is active duty, you must obtain a court order before proceeding
• The court may grant a stay of 90 days or longer
• You must appoint counsel for servicemembers who cannot appear due to military service

The #1 violation: Filing a military status affidavit without actually checking. PRG Real Estate filed 152 false affidavits. stating that tenants were not in the military when they were. That’s a federal crime punishable by fine and up to one year imprisonment.

2. Lease Termination Rights (50 U.S.C. §3955)

The rule: Servicemembers who receive PCS (Permanent Change of Station) orders, deployment orders of 90+ days, or certain other qualifying orders can terminate their lease early. with no penalties.

What this means in practice:

• When a tenant provides written notice plus a copy of military orders, you must honor the early termination
• The lease terminates 30 days after the next rent due date following proper notice
• You can only charge rent through the termination date. prorate as needed
• You cannot charge early termination fees, lease-break fees, or any other penalties
• Co-tenants (spouse, dependents) are also released from the lease
• Security deposits must be returned per your state’s standard timeline. you cannot offset with post-termination rent

The Greystar violation: Their property management software automatically applied early termination fees without checking military status. Staff were supposed to manually waive the fees for protected tenants. The manual override failed systemically. The DOJ found this to be a structural gap, not an isolated error.

3. Default Judgment Protection (50 U.S.C. §3931)

The rule: Before any court enters a default judgment against a tenant who hasn’t appeared, you must file an affidavit of military service.

What this means in practice:

• The affidavit must state whether the defendant is or is not in military service, with supporting facts
• If you cannot determine military status, you must state that. and the court must appoint an attorney before proceeding
• You must verify status through DMDC, not guesswork
• A false affidavit is a federal crime

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Where Violations Actually Happen

Based on recent enforcement actions, here are the most common failure points for property managers:

Failure 1: Generic PM Software That Doesn’t Check Military Status

Yardi, RealPage, and Entrata are lease administration platforms. They handle rent rolls, accounting, and maintenance. not SCRA compliance. When they auto-apply early termination fees, they don’t first check whether the tenant is a protected servicemember.

The DOJ’s characterization of Greystar’s system as “set-it-and-forget-it” applies to any property manager using these platforms without a separate SCRA compliance layer.

Failure 2: The Manual Override Problem

Many property managers have SCRA policies that depend on staff remembering to check military status and manually waive fees. This fails because:

• Staff turnover means new employees miss the training
• High-volume processing creates shortcuts
• There’s no system-level block preventing violations
• Nobody audits whether the policy is actually being followed

The DOJ has now established through the Greystar consent decree that manual override processes are not adequate SCRA compliance.

Failure 3: False or Missing Affidavits

PRG’s 152 false affidavits weren’t malicious. they were the result of a process that didn’t include actual military status verification. Staff filed affidavits stating tenants were not active duty without checking DMDC. At scale, this became 127 affected servicemembers and a $1.59 million settlement.

Failure 4: No Continuous Monitoring

A tenant who was civilian when they signed the lease may be active duty now. Reservists and National Guard members (800,000+ people) cycle between civilian and military status. A one-time check at lease signing becomes stale immediately.

If you file an eviction against a tenant who activated since signing the lease, and you didn’t re-check their status, you’re in violation.

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State Laws That Go Further

Several states extend protections beyond the federal SCRA:

State	Additional Protection
California	Additional lease termination rights for state-deployed servicemembers
Florida	Military lease termination rights cannot be waived or modified
North Carolina	All SCRA rights are non-waivable; coverage extends to NC National Guard
Texas	Additional protections for servicemembers and their families
Virginia	Supplemental military tenant protections

When state law is more favorable than federal law, the more protective law applies. Property managers operating across multiple states need to track the most protective standard for each jurisdiction.

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The Penalty Landscape

Company	Settlement	Violation
PRG Real Estate	$1.59M	False affidavits, default eviction judgments
Greystar	$1.4M + 5-year consent decree	Auto-applied termination fees via PM software
Lincoln Military Housing	$200K	Filed false affidavits denying active-duty status

Civil penalties per SCRA violation range from $79,380 (first offense) to $158,761 (subsequent, July 2025 inflation-adjusted). Filing a false military status affidavit is a criminal offense. And consent decrees mean 3-5 years of DOJ oversight with quarterly reporting, independent audits, and mandatory software and training changes.

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What “SCRA Compliance” Actually Requires

Based on recent consent decrees, the DOJ expects property managers to have:

1. Automated military status verification. Check DMDC before any adverse action (termination fees, eviction filings, default judgments). Not manual. Not optional.
2. System-level safeguards. Software that prevents violations before they happen, not processes that depend on staff catching them after
3. Continuous monitoring. Ongoing checks for military status changes, especially for Guard and Reserve tenants
4. Employee training. All leasing agents and property managers trained on SCRA obligations, refreshed annually
5. Audit-ready documentation. A complete record of every verification, fee decision, and tenant communication. The Greystar consent decree required an audit going back to 2018. Could you produce that today?

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Sources: DOJ. PRG Real Estate, EDVA; DOJ. Greystar, June 2025; NC State Bar. Property Manager’s Guide to the SCRA; DOJ. Financial and Housing Rights

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152 default judgments. $1.59 million. That’s what PRG Real Estate paid for filing evictions without checking military status. How many evictions did you file last year without a DMDC verification?

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