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“My boyfriend and I want to move, we were trying to find a rental. Guess who they wouldn't rent to because their landlords are homophobic/transphobic. Yes, us,” tweeted Emma Amarela. 

Emma and Thiago Leis were about to rent an apartment in Buenos Aires, with their two cats and their hedgehog. So far, so good. But when they told the landlord about Emma's transition, he backed out. 

When she found out, Emma was at work. She went to the bathroom and burst into tears. Thiago tweeted indignantly: “They won’t rent to us because of Emma’s transition. 21st century.” The reason the arrangement had fallen apart was clear: discrimination. 

Emma is not the first trans person to suffer discrimination when trying to rent a home in Buenos Aires. The National Institute Against Xenophobia and Discrimination (INADI) explained to Presentes: “We have had several cases, especially since the start of the pandemic, of trans people being discriminated against when looking for rentals, by landlords or real estate agencies. We have also had many cases of people having problems with their existing rentals, particularly trans people.” 

Furthermore, according to information from the book "The Butterfly Revolution. 10 Years After the Quest for One's Own Name", improvements in housing conditions since 2005 (the year the book was published under the coordination of activist Lohana Berkins) and after the enactment of the Gender Identity Law "are nonexistent or have worsened".

“A dose of reality”

On Monday, Thiago spoke with the neighbor who was helping him find an apartment. They wanted to find a buyer directly. The neighbor told him she already had one, that she only required the usual documents, and that she had no problem with pets. So far, so good. 

Emma asked Thiago to tell them she was transitioning. She didn't want to face discrimination in person; it was better for her to explain beforehand and avoid the unpleasant experience. "We didn't want a face-to-face encounter with the owner and for her to be discriminated against," Thiago told Presentes. The neighbor who was helping them thought there wouldn't be a problem and asked the owner. 

So he asked her, and the next day she explained that she fell "because the man was homophobic, and 'because of your partner'." That day Emma was very sad. She felt the weight of society's rejection for something as normal as renting. Thiago thinks that this experience gave them a "reality check," because their close circle of friends and family had always been there for them. 

New offers

In the days since his tweet went viral and he started giving interviews on news channels, many people have written to him offering him their apartments. A kind of solidarity network. “One person told me: I read that you're not looking in the area where I am, and I have an apartment and I'm not interested in sexual orientation or gender identity,” Thiago said. 

Emma is now studying kinesiology and loves photography. Thiago is in his final year of political science at the University of Buenos Aires and is active in the Radical Civic Union (UCR). When they met in 2018, she had not yet transitioned. She attempted it twice, once in Colombia at age 16, where she was born, and again in Argentina at age 18. 

“Then she met me, and she was afraid that because I met her as a man, I would leave her. It was quite a journey,” Thiago said. 

But he told her to follow her mother's advice: she didn't need a man to be happy. "The decision to stay and not transition wouldn't make her happy with me because she would never be who she truly is. She would never let Emma out."