Fair Housing Act - Limiting Number of Residents

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I have a small SFR and would like to limit the number people occupying the dwelling. It is 2 bedroom, one bath and a little over 600 square-foot. In the past I have had mostly two person rental agreements and they all seem to like the property when it is empty but once they squeeze in they tend to move out.

I have listed it for rent and received a flood of responses but some have large families and would never work out. Also, I allow pets but some folks want to bring in the zoo. Personally I do not have any issues with any class, protected or not, I just want to stop the "revolving door" with my tenants and do not want to violate the FHA.

I saw on an older post response by Steven Picker quoting FHA:

"As written, the FHA covers most — but not all — housing. Some exemptions to coverage under the FHA include: (a) owner-occupied buildings with no more than four units (which is commonly known as the Mrs. Murphy exemption); (b) single family housing sold or rented without the use of a broker if the private individual owner does not own more than three such single family homes at one time; or (c) housing operated by organizations and private clubs that limit occupancy to members."

Since I have two SFR rentals, one SFR home as a primary residence, and a quarter stake in a NNN commercial lease. Can I limit occupancy to one to two person only and one pet maximum? The rental is in Clark County, Vancouver Washington.

Thanks for reading.

[Russell Brazil]

The solution here may be simple, and is being overlooked.  If you got a floor of responses....raise the rent price. That will limit the amount of responses you get, thus filtering out some of the undesirable tenant situations, and garner you more rent.