May a landlord discriminate against certain people when evaluating whether or not to accept an applicant as a tenant?

Yes.  Surprised?  Read this entire post to make sure you clearly understand.  Landlords, banks and others who base their approval (or disapproval) on someone's ability to make payments on a loan or some other financial obligation may lawfully discriminate based on income, credit, current obligations and other factors.  Make no mistake about it -- this is a type of discrimination, but it is lawful discrimination.  What a landlord (or others) cannot do is unlawfully discriminate.  It is unlawful to discriminate against a tenant applicant based on race, color, religion, national origin, sex, handicap or familial status (i.e., because the applicant has children), but a landlord may discriminate against an applicant on any other basis. For example, a landlord may reject a tenant application because s/he has insufficient income, drives a motorcycle and/or because s/he is a lawyer.